Class i 




Co©iglitE?_ 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



TRANSPLANTED TRUTHS 
FROM ROMANS 



TRANSPLANTED 
TRUTHS 



BY 

ALVAH SABIN HOBART, D. D. 

Professor of New Testament Interpretation in Crozer Theological Seminary 
Author of 

"Tillage of the Heart," " Our Silent Partner," " Seed Thoughts for Right 

Living," "Transplanted Truths; or, Expositions of Great Texts 

in Ephesians," "Transplanted Truths; or, Expositions of 

Great Texts in Philippians and some Related Texts " 



PHILADELPHIA 

THE JUDSON PRESS 



BOSTON 


CHICAGO 


ST. LOUIS 


NEW YORK 


LOS ANGELES 


KANSAS CITY 


SEATTLE 


TORONTO 



e>*' 



J 



-p° ,1" 



Copyright, 1919, by 
GILBERT N. BRINK, Secretary 

Published March, 1919 



APR 'I 1319 
©Ct A 5 1286 8 



PREFATORY WORD 

The former volumes, " Transplanted Truths " from 
Ephesians and from Philippians, have brought to 
me so many words of appreciation of their helpful- 
ness that I do not feel the need of any word of 
explanation about this one. I have only to say that 
no one is more likely to notice the every-day style 
and the common-life illustrations that characterize 
it than the author. But it has been, not only in 
these books but in all my ministry, my constant 
aim to speak to the " common people." The " com- 
mon people " heard the Great Preacher of Palestine 
gladly. It is to that audience I have tried to speak; 
tried to interpret the truths of the Book into the 
thought of these " common people." If some schol- 
arly reader, interested in philosophy and higher 
theology, complains at the simplicity of this book 
this is my defense. 

These chapters have been written to help the 
common preacher to become an expositor of the 
great epistle to the " common people." 

v 



vi Prefatory Word 

A large part of the work was prepared for lec- 
tures at the summer school of the Kansas State 
Convention at Ottawa University in the spring of 
1 918. Owing to a disarrangement in the program, 
not all of the chapters were actually delivered, and 
those presented were in a greatly condensed and 
modified form. 



CONTENTS 

Chapter Page 

Introduction ix 

I. The Gospel of God i 

II. Every Man's Need of the Gospel 13 

III. Every Man's Supply 25 

IV. Justification $j 

V. The Results of Justification 45 

VI. The Great Compensation 58 

VII. The Dictionary of Faith 67 

VIII. Paul's " God Forbids " 78 

IX. The Gospel of God in Pantomime and 

Personification 92 

X. The Bridge from a Good Theology to 

a Better One 109 

XI. A Victorious Defeat 122 

XII. The Normal Work of the Holy 

Spirit in the Christian 134 

XIII. What About the Jews? 149 

XIV. The Christian Liturgy 161 

XV. The Christian and the State 173 

XVI. The Requirements of Christian Fel- 
lowship 185 

vii 



INTRODUCTION 



One of the essential things in the study of any book 
is to know something of the times and the purpose 
of the author. Another important element is the 
style of the author. In the study of this chapter we 
will try to get in touch with the situation and then 
examine for a little the style of the author. 

We are told at the outset that it is written by 
Paul, "a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an 
apostle — set apart to the gospel of God, which he 
promised beforehand through his prophets." 

This man who thus tells us his official standing 
was a great-souled man. We read that when he 
was a young man he was a very zealous Jew. His 
family was one of more than common rank, for 
his father, a full-blooded Jew, had obtained citi- 
zenship in the Roman nation, and that cost much 
money and was allowed only to such as gave 
promise of being worth something to the Roman 
Government. 

His early boyhood was spent in Tarsus, a city 
of Cilicia, and there he had opportunity to see the 
idolatrous world, and to test his own faith. He 
wrote of himself that as touching the ceremonial 
law he was blameless ; which means that, as a boy, 
living in a city where to be a Jew was like being 

ix 



Introduction 



a Protestant American in a Spanish or Austrian 
Roman Catholic city, when other boys were at play 
he kept the Sabbath ; when other boys were profane 
he took not the name of God in vain ; when others 
went to Roman shows, where men fought unto 
death, he went to the synagogue. He was not one 
of those Sunday School book boys who are " too 
proud to fight/' and so good that they die early. 

If the boy is father to the man we may be sure 
that Paul stood up like a man when others abused 
him. 

Later he was sent away to Jerusalem to school. 
He went to Gamaliel, one of the great theologians 
of his time. It was like sending a boy now to some 
noted school where only the best can go; and 
there, as he says (Phil. 3 : 4-7), he was among the 
best scholars in Hebrew learning, and during all 
his course of study he did not slacken his zeal in 
religion. 

Then when he was a man he came into promi- 
nence and was made a member of the Sanhedrim 
That was the great Theological Court of the Jewish 
Church, and here he was a man full of zeal and 
determination, so that when Stephen was tried he 
voted to have him stoned to death, and when this 
was being done Paul was an official witness, and 
held the coats of those who pelted Stephen with 
stones until he died. And later still he went and 
begged the privilege of being made an ecclesiastical 
sheriff to hunt out women and children and drag 



Introduction xi 



them to prison and to death that he might stamp 
out entirely the whole force of what he verily 
thought was sinful heresy. 

But something happened to him. He was con- 
verted on his way to Damascus. All his views of 
Jesus changed, and from that time instead of being 
a persecutor he was a preacher of Christ, a servant 
of the Lord Jesus, as he calls himself. 

But he did not become a mere non-persecutor. 
His conversion did not take out his manhood. That 
same devotion to principle and that same faith in 
God which made him the dangerous enemy to the 
church, were now simply transferred to a new cause, 
and he gave to that cause the same loyalty he had 
formerly given to the Jewish idea. 

But since he was an apostle, a man sent out to 
tell the Gentile world about Christ, he took the 
people into his affections. After he had preached 
and established churches, he carried them in his 
heart. Daily he prayed for them, and gave thanks 
for them. He wrote them letters of instruction 
and comfort as occasions required. 

The churches of Thessalonica and Galatia, Ephe- 
sus and Corinth, Philippi and Colosse had a place in 
his thought and care. This letter to Romans has a 
special quality different from the others in that it 
was written to a church he did not start, and with 
which he had no acquaintance. The tone of the 
letter shows us something of the recognition he al- 
ready had among the churches. If he had been 



xii Introduction 



just an ordinary disciple he would not have begun 
by saying, I am an apostle. 

Again he says, I am coming to see you and I 
hope to have some fruit among you, and then to 
move on into Spain where no one has been before 
me, for I do not want to build on another man's 
foundation. 

But the striking feature of the letter is that it 
is a doctrinal discussion of the central ideas of 
theology. It is a formal argument all the way 
through. There is no allusion to any prominent 
special errors at Rome ; no case that needs discipline 
as at Corinth ; no heretical teachers as among Gala- 
tian churches; no false teaching or undue anxiety 
about the return of Christ as at Thessalonica. 

But he is setting forth in a systematic way the 
fundamental teachings of the Christian soteriology. 
It is impersonal and uncontroversial. 

For this reason it has been the fountain of in- 
structions in every century. Paul's writings were 
such that since his day no man has written or can 
write on the subject of theology with any degree 
of fulness without taking account of him. 1 One 
must either agree with him or refute his arguments. 
Paul was the founder of systematic theology. But 
he was not a dry theologian. His letters are alive, 
and warm with affection. It is said that the golden- 
mouthed preacher of Constantinople glowed with 

1 " The distinguishing doctrines of Christianity can be traced to the 
apostle Paul." — E. H. Johnson. 



Introduction xiii 



the great climaxes of Paul's argument. Augustine 
laid aside his dialectics to take up the profound 
philosophy of redemption found in this letter. 
Luther's electric batteries were charged with Paul's 
teaching about justification. Calvin was saturated 
with the great logical arguments of Paul. 

Wherever the opinions of the church have been 
in formation, or wherever they have been brought 
into question, there Paul's arguments have been the 
standard of correctness. 

One writer has gone so far as to say that Paul 
has eclipsed Jesus in the realm of theology ; and 
others, as if they feared Paul's leadership, have 
said we must " get back to Christ." 

THE ROMAN CHURCH 

No historical record remains to tell us when or 
how the Church at Rome was started. It comes 
into history all at once. Paul says " to the church 
at Rome." Roman Catholics have claimed that 
Peter founded it. But there is no evidence except 
"Catholic say-so, and that is worthless in such 
matters. 

But it was there. It was evidently composed in 
part of Jewish converts, and in part of Gentile 
membership. 

The letter does not attempt to separate them. 
But the argument deals with questions that the 
thoughtful would ask, whether they were Jew or 



xiv Introduction 



Gentile. It deals with the five fundamental re- 
ligious facts of life — such things as all men must 
deal with: 

First, The sense of God ; secondly, The sense of 
deficiency in our life; thirdly, The divine way of 
relief; fourthly, Inward satisfaction; fifthly, Re- 
sultant duties. 

Those five things must be considered by every 
man who thinks about life with any seriousness, 
and each one of these Paul discussed carefully. He 
had very definite views about each one, and he sys- 
tematically dealt with them all. 

One might study Romans around those five 
points, and one would find an almost complete body 
of doctrine. 

Paul seems to have thought out the whole sub- 
ject. He states his view; then he proves it; then 
points out its value; then replies to misconceptions 
or false inference; then states the duties growing 
out of it all. 

HIS STYLE 

In one of his letters he said, " I am all things to 
all men, only always under law to Christ." He 
met Gentiles on Gentile ground. He met the Jew 
on his ground. He did not sneer at others, but 
tried to lead them to better ground. 

The modern doctrine of pedagogy that we must 
find a point of contact — mental and moral contact — 
and from that point lead minds out to better posi- 



Introduction xv 



tions, he knew how to use, whether he formulated 
it or not. 

He reasoned with the argumentative. He stirred 
the emotional by his outbursts of confidence. He 
upset the extremist by his " God forbids." He 
gratified the Jew by his habitual use of Old Testa- 
ment writings. 

But there is one very striking feature of his 
style that needs attention lest he be made into a 
mere peddler of logic, and that is his use of meta- 
phors and similes. 

In this connection we need to notice the law of 
metaphors. A metaphor is a term borrowed from 
one realm of things to convey an idea in another 
realm. Thus we say, " Ye are the salt of the 
earth." We mean that Christians have a function 
in the realm of the mind or of the spirit similar 
to the function of salt in the material world. 

We say a man is a " pillar in the church." We 
mean that he does in a spiritual way what the pillar 
does in the material building. 

We say Jesus is the Shepherd. We mean that 
the relation between the shepherd of sheep and his 
flock is like that which Jesus has to his people. 

There is always a point of similarity between 
realms. A little girl said, " a parable is an earthly 
story with a heavenly meaning." That is, there 
is a kind of parallelism carried on in the mind 
between the " earthly story " and the " heavenly 
meaning." 



xvi Introduction 



In order to catch the meaning of a metaphor one 
must be familiar with the thing that is used as a 
metaphor, or he cannot get the meaning it is in- 
tended to convey. 

For example, in one of my classes I asked what 
is the point of likeness in the metaphor, " Ye are the 
salt of the earth." Most of the men said, " Salt 
keeps meat from spoiling, and we must keep society 
from moral corruption." But another one said: 
" No. Salt makes things taste good, and we must 
make the world livable." When asked for his reason 
he said : " Jesus said, If the salt have lost its savor. 
That belongs to the realm of taste." And then he 
strengthened his argument by saying that they did 
not salt meat in that place, they dried it in the sun. 

Now without settling that question we can all 
see that unless we understand the use of salt there 
we shall miss the Saviour's thought. 

At another time we were discussing the meaning 
of leaven. I found several men who had no idea 
of leaven, or of bread-making. They were brought 
up in the city, and their mothers never baked a loaf 
of bread — they bought it at the baker's. So all 
they knew about leaven was that some one had 
told them it was a form of corruption, and a symbol 
of evil, and of course when Jesus said the kingdom 
of heaven was like leaven in a measure of meal 
they jumped to the conclusion that the church is 
going to evil. If they had found the basis of that 
metaphor they would have recalled how with a 



Introduction xvii 



little yeast stirred into a pan of flour and left to 
stand in a warm place overnight, the whole pan of 
meal will become — not a pan of yeast or of rotten 
flour, but a mass of light, promising dough ready 
to be baked into wholesome and delicious bread. 
Since the point of comparison is the transforming 
power of the Christian gospel, they would have 
seen the truth Jesus sought to convey. So we 
must always look for the basis of a metaphor. 

Another fact about metaphors is that speakers 
pick up their metaphors from the mental atmos- 
phere about them. Just now how full our speech 
is of expressions that come from the war : " Over 
the top," " over there/' " service flags and stars/' 
" keep your alignment," " keep step," " firing-line," 
"in the trenches," "at the front," "neutrals," 
" Allies," and many more words that are picked 
up and drafted into service, and made to do duty 
at the front of the battle-lines of the conflict of 
ideas. 

Mr. Sunday is a most remarkable example of a 
man who picks his metaphors to suit his audience. 
In a parlor of some rich woman he speaks with 
beauty and elegance. He goes into the railroad 
shops and his tongue changes to the tongue of an 
expert railroad man. To the baseball men he talks 
about " bases," and " putting one over," and " foul 
balls/' and " home runs," and " putting men out." 

The only class of words he finds difficulty in be- 
ing familiar with are theological terms — those he 

B 



xviii Introduction 



has not mastered very well. But when you want 
to hear or read the only really accurate and satis- 
factory description of the saloon-keepers get Mr. 
Sunday's sermon on " Booze." 

This choice of metaphors accounts for the great 
difference in the books of the New Testament. 
They are written with the words that the people 
were familiar with, and with the metaphors that 
were common among their readers. The writers 
had certain great ideas they wished to convey and 
they did just as we do. They picked out the meta- 
phors and phrases that were familiar, and that 
carried the biggest load of meaning right to the 
mind and heart of the people. 

This accounts for the fact that certain classes of 
metaphors are found in one book, and not found 
in others. Take the letter to the Philippians, for 
example. This has no reference to temple or sac- 
rifice, to judge or king, to prophet or church or 
Scriptures. But it talks about fellowships and gos- 
pel and bonds and sufferings. It is full of expres- 
sions of his love for them. It exhorts to patience, 
but it argues nothing. 

Peter writes to Jewish converts scattered abroad, 
away from their holy city and temple. They were 
believers in Christ, but they were in great perplex- 
ity because the glory they had expected to have 
had not come. Instead of having a country and a 
temple and a priesthood they were of the " disper- 
sion " — the " scattered about " — so he says to them, 



Introduction xix 



in metaphor big with meaning, " We are begotten 
unto a living hope " — not like your old one that 
has died out — " to an inheritance incorruptible and 
undefiled that does not fade away " — as your 
earthly one has faded — " reserved in heaven " — not 
in Judea — " for those who are faithful." " Gird 
up your loins and wait for the grace that will come 
to you at the revelation of the Lord Jesus." You 
are to be " living stones," built into a " temple of 
the Lord." You are a " kingly race, a royal priest- 
hood," " the very people of God." You see how all 
those metaphors would touch sympathetic chords, 
and convey understandable things to those Jewish 
people. 

If we turn to Hebrews we come into the fra- 
grance of the incense of the temple. Here we find 
"sin" and "sin offering," "altars," and "ap- 
proaches," " great high priest," and days of " atone- 
ment," " veil of the temple," and " priesthood like 
that of Melchizedek." All the way through we are 
listening to religious talk in the religious dialect of 
Jewish Christians who were being taught that the 
temple and the ceremonies were shadows of things 
whose reality was now at hand. 

If we go back to the Gospels we find Jesus says 
almost nothing about temple or sacrifices. God is 
not spoken of much as King, or Judge, or Avenger, 
but " Our Father in heaven." In the view of Jesus 
men are not subjects, nor soldiers, nor rulers, 
neither great ones nor small ones, but brethren. 



xx Introduction 



The metaphors come from the family life, and the 
spirit is the family spirit. 

I have dwelt upon this because I want to help 
you to see that Paul's metaphors are not to be 
taken as literal descriptions, or as doctrinal for- 
mulas. They are forms of expression suitable to 
those to whom he talked, and were chosen by the 
same principle that Mr. Sunday follows when he 
takes the words of the ballgame to tell the gospel 
to the ball-players. One must get into the heart 
of them or he will miss the teaching entirely. 

ROME 

Paul was writing to Romans at Rome. It was 
the great legal center for the wide-reaching domin- 
ions of the Empire. Roman minds had studied the 
problems of ruling over various races and classes, 
and had evolved a set of laws and a form of gov- 
ernment that in many respects have been the model 
for the nations since then. English and American 
law is largely indebted to Rome. Courts and law- 
yers, criminals and crimes, law and pardon, guilt 
and innocence were all familiar words, and to Paul 
punishments and prisons were all too well known by 
experience. And so in writing to them he naturally 
uses the words and illustrations that are legal in 
character. When he spoke about sins and trans- 
gressions, about justifications and redemptions, 
about guilt and innocence, he was expressing the 



Introduction xxi 



thoughts common to all men in words common to 
Romans. 

We may not expect, therefore, to find him deal- 
ing with exact theological formulas, which we are 
bound to accept and use, but he was putting his 
thought into forms understandable by them. 

I would press this truth further. If we are 
bound to take metaphors in Romans as the formal 
exact expressions of the relations of men to God, 
why must we not take the metaphors in Hebrews in 
the same literal way ? And, if we do, then we must 
say that there is a temple, and a priest, and a holy 
city, and tithes, and circumcision, and Gentiles out- 
side the court. And when we come back to the 
Gospels we must drop these and think of ourselves 
as neither in Rome before the Judge, nor in Jeru- 
salem at the gate of the temple, but in our Father's 
family, perhaps like " prodigal sons " returned for 
bread only, but finding forgiveness and a feast. 

There are great spiritual values in these expres- 
sions, and as Doctor Bushnell said : " We cannot 
afiford to lose them. They fill an office which noth- 
ing else can fill, and serve a use which cannot be 
served without them. . . We can do without 
them, it may be, for a little while, but after a time 
we seem to be in a gospel that has no atmosphere, 
and our breathing is in a gasping state. . . Our 
very prayers get introverted and muddled. . . We 
begin to sigh for some altar whither we may go 
and just see the fire burning and the smoke going 



xxii Introduction 



up on its own account, and circle about it with our 
believing hymns." 

Making these allowances for the metaphorical 
uses we may find in Romans what becomes a frame- 
work for our thinking. But we may not assume 
that no other form of expression is good. What 
we want is to know the way of life, marked out in 
the way most understandable by us. But we shall 
try to study his letter as if we were in Rome, for 
in no other way can it do us any good. We shall 
try, through his words, to see the common idea, 
and to identify his thoughts with things in our 
own experience, and if possible transplant them into 
our thinking. 



CHAPTER I 



THE GOSPEL OF GOD 



" Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apos- 
tle, separated unto the gospel of God, which he prom- 
ised afore through his prophets in the holy Scrip- 
tures." — Romans i : i, 2. 

The first impressions of people are often regulative 
of the later ones. Especially is this true of some 
very sensitive individuals. They cannot tell why, 
but they " feel/' as if by a sort of extra sense, drawn 
or repelled by people on first acquaintance. Some 
salesmen say that much of their success in " selling " 
a new customer depends on the first impressions 
made in the first few minutes of their acquaintance. 
Military men say that in a large measure the vic- 
tory of an onset is determined by the success of 
the first contact with the enemy. It is also true 
of books. The impression made by the introduc- 
tory chapters determines whether one will read the 
rest or not. 

This is true in part of the book of Romans. But 
it is not true that its favorable impressions are de- 
pendent wholly on the first impressions. A study 
of the arguments, and the defenses against error, 
and the rich expressions of truth have, in many 

1 



2 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

cases, overcome the impressions that men had when 
they first began to read this great letter. 

But this first sentence grips the attention at once. 
Its grip tightens as we think about it. " Set apart 
to the gospel of God!' This great-hearted, large- 
minded man consecrated to the " gospel of God " ! 
This letter, written with great care and closely rea- 
soned argument, thought out in great detail to meet 
the spiritual needs of the disciples of Christ Jesus 
in Rome — to tell them about the "-gospel of God " ! 
Surely the topic of it is attractive. 

"Gospel"; let us examine this word a little. It 
has been called the equivalent of " good news," but 
that is not an accurate translation of it. The mes- 
sage of Paul was not " news." He says it is a 
message about things which God promised afore 
through his prophets in the holy Scriptures. And 
as he goes along with his letter he often quotes the 
Old Testament as proof of his conclusions, and de- 
clares that what he is now preaching is but the ful- 
filment of the Old Testament promises. It was 
not news in the sense of being fundamentally new 
to his readers. All its ethical principles had been 
known for centuries. The " man of God " as de- 
scribed in Genesis does not differ in essentials from 
the one drawn in Matthew. Abraham, transplanted 
to America, would command our respect. The 
Greek word is better represented by " good mes- 
sage " than by " good news." The angel that an- 
nounced the birth of the child in the khan at Beth- 



The Gospel of God 



lehem said, " I bring you good tidings " — not 
" new " ones. The only element of newness was 
the fact that the long-looked-for had now arrived. 

TRUTHS TO TRANSPLANT 

The gospel of God is a "good message." Once 
in my early ministry we had been holding some 
special services hoping to lead men to accept 
the Saviour. At the close of one session I ap- 
proached a man who had been there, saying I 
should be glad to help him to know the Christian 
faith. He replied, " Oh, I am going to take my 
medicine with the others." I said, " I do not quite 
catch your thought/' " Oh," he answered, " I shall 
go to hell no doubt, but I am not going to whine 
about it." " But," I said, " I have not been trying 
to send you to hell. I want to help you to heaven.'' 
On further conversation I found that his idea of a 
minister's duty was to tell men they were on the 
way to hell; that the preacher's message is one of 
condemnation rather than one of reconciliation. 
They are not, in his view, set apart unto the glad 
message of God but unto a sad one. 

There is a sad side to life, and sometimes the 
true friend must tell men that death and the judg- 
ment await those who persist in disobedience to 
God: that the judgment will at some time strip 
away all masks, and all deceptions from sin, and 
the souls will stand naked and alone before the 



4 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

Judge who will sadly say, " I never knew you." 
Jesus had to say that, and he wept when he said 
it. But the main business of the minister is, like 
Paul's, to declare to men the glad message, not 
a sad one. 

The gospel of God is a message of justification. 
No message can be of greater import and value 
than the one that tells us how to be right with 
God. The old statements of doctrine say, " The 
great gospel blessing is justification." Once have 
that, and the way is open for God to pour out upon 
us the riches of his gracious designs. Until we 
are set right with him, he cannot do for us what 
his love would prompt him to do. Note some of 
the joyful things growing out of the message of 
justification, good in any age: 

" There is now no condemnation to them that are 
in Christ Jesus " (Rom. 8 : i). 

" Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy " 
(Luke 2 : io). 

" Whosoever believeth on him shall not perish " 
(John 3 : 16). 

" Him that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast 
out" (John 6 : 37). 

" He hath anointed me to preach good tidings to 
the poor. He hath sent me to proclaim release to 
captives, and the recovering of sight to the blind; 
to set at liberty them that are bruised, to proclaim 
the acceptable year of the Lord" (Luke 4 : 18, 
19). 



The Gospel of God 



" Every one that asketh receiveth ; and he that 
seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall 
be opened" (Matt. 7 : 8). 

" Like as Christ was raised from the dead 
through the glory of the Father, so we also might 
walk in newness of life" (Rom. 6:4). 

" He will fashion anew the body of our humilia- 
tion that it may be conformed to the body of his 
glory " (Phil. 3 : 21). 

" He who began a good work in you will con- 
tinue it until the day of Jesus Christ " (Phil. 1:6). 

" I will come again and receive you unto myself ; 
that where I am, there ye may be also " (John 

14 : 3)- 

" God shall wipe away every tear from their 
eyes ; and death shall be no more ; neither shall there 
be mourning, nor crying, nor pain, any more " 
(Rev. 21 : 4). 

" Every knee shall bow and every tongue confess? 
that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the 
Father " (Phil. 2 : 9-11). 

These are the notes of the melody that runs 
through the Song of Redemption of which Paul's 
letter was one solo with his own variations. Paul, 
like the Psalmist before him, was no pessimist. 
He sang no song in the minor key. His word was 
" O taste and see that the Lord is good : blessed 
is the man that trusteth in him." (Ps. 34 : 8). 

This is one great special feature of the gospel of 
God. Those who have it commend it to others. 



6 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

Dr. Howard Furness, writing after a lengthy ex- 
amination of spiritual mediums, said he found their 
claims a species of fraud imposed on an uncritical 
public; and that he wrote over the whole subject 
the sentence that Dante said was inscribed over 
Hades, " Abandon hope all ye who enter here." 

Hume, the English philosopher, said to a friend, 
" You have no idea to what lonesomeness my philos- 
ophy has reduced me." The great scientist Charles 
Darwin said : " I sometimes feel that there may be 
in the universe a great being analogous to man back 
of all things ; but then the feeling goes away, and I 
shall die an agnostic." Such are the consolations 
of the men who propound the solutions of life out- 
side the gospel of God. But Paul rose above all 
such and lived in the sunlight of the upper air, 
above the mountains and above the clouds. 

The gospel of God is an ancient message. Paul 
says it was preached afore through the prophets. 
In Galatians he wrote that it was preached before- 
hand unto Abraham. (Gal. 3:8.) In the earliest 
records it was stated that the promise was, In the 
" seed of Abraham " all nations shall be blessed. 
And Paul says that the " seed " to which reference 
was made was Christ Jesus. 

And still earlier it was said, " The seed of the 
woman shall bruise the serpent's head." Vague as 
that statement was, it contained the seed of hope 
for the final victory of good over evil. The great 
Messianic oratorio of prophecy began, not, like 



The Gospel of God 



Handel's, with Isaiah's " Comfort ye my people," 
but with that far-off hint in Genesis of coming de- 
liverance. Then the angel of Jehovah took up the 
message, " Thy seed shall be as the stars for mul- 
titude/' Moses came in to say : " God will raise up 
unto you from among your brethren a prophet like 
unto me. Unto him shall ye harken." David 
spoke of him as one who should have " dominion 
from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends 
of the earth." Isaiah said : " He hath borne our 
griefs, and carried our sorrows," " by his stripes 
we are healed." 

The angel sang at his birth, " Unto you is born 
this day a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord " 
(Luke 2 : n). And now Paul is chosen from 
his birth to go and speak the gospel of God to all 
the nations. 

It gives an element of value to learn that Paul 
was not giving a new theory of his own : not, like 
so-called Christian science, a philosophy concocted 
from the gathered fragments of worn-out and dis- 
carded schemes; nor was his message the sifted 
and refined residuum of truth that Greek or Roman 
religions may have contained. He was telling them 
of a glad message which originated with God and 
had been unfolding in history for centuries. Each 
singer in the great song of redemption had fol- 
lowed his own part of the music guided by the 
great leader, paying attention not to his fellow 
singers but the notes and the baton of his leader. 



8 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

Kingdoms had arisen, flourished, and gone into 
oblivion since that song began. Assyria, Egypt, 
Babylon, ancient Greece, and the flower of Rome 
had all passed into forgotten history since the angel 
spoke to Abraham the message of salvation by 
faith. But the people who knew the joyful sound 
continued and still continue to be the greatest proof 
of the divine authorship of Paul's gospel. 

Paul was not presenting himself as a soul- 
physician administering a man-made cure for sin, 
but he was administering a divine remedy under 
the directions of the Great Physician. 

This gospel antedates the ceremonial law of 
Moses (Gal. 3 : 17), and it outlives it. The law 
came in for a season (Gal. 3 : 19) and went out 
when its work was done as flowers fall off when 
the fruit sets, or as shells break when the eaglets 
are hatched. (Heb. 8 : 13.) It will live when 

The stars grow cold, 
And the leaves of the judgment-book unfold. 

The gospel of God is a Christ message. Christ, 
who was humanly born of the seed of David, by 
the holiness of his life and the fact of his resurrec- 
tion, was declared to be the Son of God. The cen- 
tral purpose of the message is to present this Son 
to the world. Paul probably knew some of the 
philosophy of his times. He could not have lived 
in Tarsus as a boy, in Jerusalem as a theological 
student, and afterward preached in many cities be- 



The Gospel of God 



fore he wrote this letter, and not have become in a 
good measure informed about the thinking of the 
world. He knew well the ethical teachings of the 
Jewish prophets and the requirements of the cere- 
monial law ; but he passed by all these — not as un- 
important or as destitute of some truth — but that 
he might preach the Son of God. He wrote con- 
cerning his work in Corinth, " I determined to know 
nothing among you but Jesus Christ and him cruci- 
fied/' He wrote to the Galatians that he had set 
forth Jesus " evidently crucified." In his letters he 
says that Christ is the " propitiation for our sins," 
and that we are saved through " faith in his blood." 
He is " our Lord and Master." He is the " Head 
over all things to his church, which is his body." 
It is the purpose of God to " gather together in one 
all things in Christ." 

Christ is the pattern man. " Put ye on the Lord 
Jesus Christ " ; " Let that mind be in you which 
was in Christ Jesus." He is made unto us " wis- 
dom and righteousness." Paul gloried in the Cross 
of Christ. He looked forward with anticipation to 
the return of Christ, and if he died before that 
event, he expected to depart and be with Christ, 
which was far better. And all is to be crowned by 
the resurrection and life with Christ. His gospel 
is Christocentric. 

We of this day, when the ethical element is justly 
given an unusual emphasis, are in danger of sepa- 
rating the ethical element prominent in Jesus' teach- 



io Transplanted Truths from Romans 

ings from his person, and make that .a sufficient re- 
quirement for our life and hope. This is not 
Pauline. He would not take the livery of Christ 
in which to serve the pride of his own heart. He 
followed the teachings of Jesus, but he depended 
on the help and inspiration from the person of 
Christ to give him ability to do so. If men asked 
him what they needed to do for salvation he re- 
plied, not " Correct your life," as the mere moralist 
says, nor " Turn over a new leaf," as some re- 
formers say, nor " Quit your meanness," as Sam 
Jones used to say, nor " Right about face," as Mr. 
Moody used to say — all of which is right, but not 
sufficient ; but " Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, 
and you shall be saved." All those other things 
were involved in his reply as the rose is involved 
in the rosebud. Once in Him, and these follow. 
Paul had no message for men who were not " in 
Christ" except to urge them to get into him by 
faith. His gospel was the gospel of the Son of God. 
And the gladness of his message grew out of that 
fact. 

We can well afford to magnify Christ and let 
our devotion and loyalty to him work out our de- 
liverance from minor troubles about theology and 
ecclesiology. 

The gospel of God is a world message. Paul 
says his commission was " unto obedience of faith 
among all nations." That is, he sought, and the 
purpose of his apostleship was to bring it to pass, 



The Gospel of God n 

that people from among every nation should be- 
come obedient to God. But it is to be noticed that 
he does not say a fear-obedience, nor a ceremonial- 
obedience, nor a reasoned-out obedience, but a faith- 
obedience. That is, men would have >obedience to 
the teachings of Jesus because they have such faith 
in him that his word becomes their law by a sort of 
spiritual instinct. 

This idea is worth transplanting. One writer has 
said : " The highest life formed in us by the Spirit 
of God and directed to ends outside ourselves is, 
■ To do right because God requires it ; to trust 
Christ because he deserves it; to love the brother 
whoever he is.' " 1 The first of these is no doubt a 
sound principle, but it is not the highest aim. Mr. 
Ruskin once said that if we keep on doing right we 
shall come to like doing so, and until we do we are 
in an immoral stage. Paul aimed at obedience 
growing out of faith in Christ. Those who have 
had experience in this kind of obedience are satis- 
fied that his way is the best ; that on any utilitarian 
basis Christ's way offers the best justification. But 
we are bound to follow it before that justification 
appears. But the great truth just now in mind is 
that the gospel of God is for all nations. Nothing 
is made more emphatic in Paul's life than the out- 
bursting interest he had in all nations. His first 
call was to go unto the Gentiles (Acts 9 : 15), 

" E. H. Johnson, in " Highest Life," p. 68- 
C 



12 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

and the last we hear of him he was seeking to get 
where no others had preceded him with the mes- 
sage. He would preach the unsearchable riches of 
Christ to the Gentiles. This feature of the letter 
should have our careful thought. The more one 
thinks about it the more certain he becomes that a 
message that is not for all is not worth much for 
any. If a man were to preach that he had a mes- 
sage from God suited only for the Anglo-Saxon 
race, it would be at once discredited. For God 
is one not two. He is not double-faced or two- 
sided. And he is God of Jews as well as of the 
Gentiles. Therefore the message of salvation from 
him must be for all mankind. This was the teach- 
ing of Jesus when he said : " Go, and disciple all 
nations; preach the gospel to every creature." 

It follows, then, that until our own hearts have 
become interested in all men to the extent that ac- 
cording to our opportunities and abilities we are 
ready to give them the gospel of God, we are not 
in full harmony with the gospel itself. Our own 
hearts need attuning to the key in which the song 
of salvation has been written. 

To gather up then the great ideas of this, letter : 

The gospel of God is a glad message. 

It is a message of pardon. 

Tt is an ancient message. 

It is a Christ-centered message. 

It is a message for the world. 



CHAPTER II 

EVERY MAN'S NEED OF THE GOSPEL 

" That every mouth may be stopped." — Rom. 3 : ig. 

In a former study it was shown that Paul puts his 
thought in systematic and logical form. His great 
proposition as stated in Chap. 1 : 16 is, " The gos- 
pel is the power of God unto salvation to every one 
that believeth!' The way in which he goes on to 
discuss it shows that the emphasis in his thought is 
expressed by reading it, " The gospel is the only 
power of God for salvation to every one that 
believeth." That is, if men do not find salvation in 
that way they will not find it. He then proceeds 
to make them see the truth of his statement. His 
argument may be skeletonized as follows : 

1. He assumes that men need salvation. 

2. They must obtain it either by their own merit 
or in some other way. 

3. Then he goes on to show that on the basis of 
personal merit they do not have any hope. This 
conclusion is stated in the text. Up to the twenty- 
first verse of Chapter 3 his whole aim is to show this 
to be the true situation. 

I shall try to follow his line of thought carefully, 
and then consider some of the permanent ideas that 

13 



14 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

may be transplanted into our times and the field 
of our needs. 

He says ( i : 18), " The wrath of God is revealed 
against all unrighteousness of men who hinder the 
truth in unrighteousness!' That is, those men who, 
because of their iniquities, suppress the true idea of 
living, are the objects of divine displeasure. Stated 
in the dialect of the courts of Rome, conceived of 
in the terms of government, all subjects have their 
peace and safety only when they keep the laws. If 
they violate them, or come short of them, they be- 
come at once automatically more or less the objects 
of governmental prosecution. Sooner or later they 
will come before the judge. 

But he recognizes that there are three classes of 
people, each one of which classes, while admitting 
the justice of the principle he has declared, never- 
theless by one reason or another seeks to excuse 
itself from the application of the law. 

First, there is the mass of people in Rome, and 
in all the outside world, who might say of them- 
selves — as many people now say about the same 
class — " These pagan people did not know, and 
therefore they are not condemned. " 

This view Paul squarely denies. For him the 
very conditions of the people bore testimony to the 
displeasure of the God of nature. They were not, 
as some men say, in a process of evolution toward 
a knowledge of God in which they slowly disen- 
tangled themselves from natural superstitions. He 



Every Man's. Need of the Gospel 15 

thinks of it as the result of a process of devolution. 
With swift pen he describes their journey. They 
are not ignorant ; " because that which may be 
known of God is manifest in them ; for God mani- 
fested it unto them. For the invisible things of 
him since the creation of the world are clearly 
seen, being perceived through the things that are 
made, even his everlasting power and divinity ; that 
they may be without excuse ; because that, knowing 
God, they glorified him not as God, neither gave 
thanks; but became vain in their reasonings, and 
their senseless heart was darkened. Professing 
themselves to be wise, they became fools, and 
changed the glory of the incorruptible God for the 
likeness of an image of corruptible man, and of 
birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things." 
It was for these things that " God gave them up 
in the lusts of their hearts unto uncleanness, that 
their bodies should be dishonoured among them- 
selves; for that they exchanged the truth of God 
for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature 
rather than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. 
For this cause God gave them up unto vile pas- 
sions ; for their women changed the natural use 
into that which is against nature ; and likewise also 
the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, 
burned in their lust one toward another, men with 
men working unseemliness, and receiving in them- 
selves that recompense of their error which was 
due." 



16 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

And not only did their sins return physical ruin, 
but the whole mental and moral nature was cor- 
rupted and, " even as they refused to have God in 
their knowledge, God gave them up unto a repro- 
bate mind, to do those things which are not fitting ; 
being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, 
covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, 
strife, deceit, malignity ; whisperers, backbiters, 
hateful to God, insolent, haughty, boastful, invent- 
ors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without 
understanding, covenant-breakers, without natural 
affection, unmerciful; who, knowing the ordinance 
of God, that they which practise such things are 
worthy of death, not only do* the same, but also 
consent with them that practise them." 

That record and those conditions were the con- 
tinuous evidences — the loud-speaking witnesses — 
that the God of the world had attached sad conse- 
quences to ingratitude and neglect of him. His 
displeasure was not written on the skies, nor in 
the books of prophets; but men received in them- 
selves, as they went along, the just recompense of 
their deeds; and these were the sure witnesses to 
divine displeasure : testimony that their conduct was 
against the constitution of things. 

Then he addresses himself to another class, the 
moralists of the city. There were many of these. 
Seneca was one. Stoic philosophers abounded. 
Seneca's writings contain much that ranks with 
Christian teaching. Some have thought he had 



Every Mans Need of the Gospel iy 

some acquaintance with Paul. But Seneca, and his 
companions in morals, practised things that cannot 
be mentioned in public. To them Paul speaks : 
Since you say that knowledge of the divine way is 
necessary, all the more are you guilty, for " thou 
art without excuse, O man, whosoever thou art that 
judgest: for wherein thou judgest another, thou 
condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest dost prac- 
tise the same things. And we know that the judg- 
ment of God is according to truth against them 
that practise such things. And reckonest thou this, 
O man, who judgest them that practise such things, 
and doest the same, that thou shalt escape the judg- 
ment of God? Or despisest thou the riches of his 
goodness and forbearance and longsuffering, not 
knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to 
repentance? but after thy hardness and impenitent 
heart treasurest up for thyself wrath in the day 
of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment 
of God; who will render to every man according 
to his works ; to them that by patience in well-doing 
seek for glory and honour and incorruption, eternal 
life: but unto them that are factious and obey not 
the truth, but obey unrighteousness, shall be wrath 
and indignation, tribulation and anguish upon every 
soul of man that worketh evil, of the Jew first, and 
also of the Greek ; but glory and honour and peace 
to every man that worketh good, to the Jew first, 
and also to the Greek, for there is no respect of per- 
sons with God. For as many as have sinned without 



18 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

law shall also perish without law; and as many as 
have sinned under law shall be judged by law; for 
not the hearers of a law are just before God, but 
the doers of a law shall be justified ; for when Gen- 
tiles, which have no law, do by nature the things 
of the law, these, having no law, are a law unto 
themselves ; in that they shew the work of the law 
written in their hearts, their conscience bearing wit- 
ness therewith, and their thoughts one with another 
accusing or else excusing them; in the day when 
God shall judge the secrets of men, according to 
my gospel, by Jesus Christ." 

Then he writes to another class — to the ceremo- 
nialistic Jews — and says : " But if thou bearest the 
name of a Jew, and restest upon the law, and glo- 
riest in God, and knowest his will, and approvest 
the things that are excellent, being instructed out 
of the law, and art confident that thou thyself art a 
guide of the blind, a light of them that are in dark- 
ness, a corrector of the foolish, a teacher of babes, 
having in the law the form of knowledge and of the 
truth ; thou therefore that teachest another, teachest 
thou not thyself ? thou that preachest a man should 
not steal, dost thou steal? thou that sayest a man 
should not commit adultery, dost thou commit adul- 
tery? thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou rob tem- 
ples? thou who gloriest in the law, through thy 
transgression of the law dishonourest thou God? 
For the name of God is blasphemed among the Gen- 
tiles because of you, even as it is written. For cir- 



Every Mans Need of the Gospel 19 

cumcision indeed profiteth, if thou be a doer of the 
law; but if thou be a transgressor of the law, thy 
circumcision is become uncircumcision. If there- 
fore the uncircumcision keep the ordinances of the 
law, shall not his uncircumcision be reckoned for 
circumcision? and shall not the uncircumcision 
which is by nature, if it fulfil the law, judge thee, 
who with the letter and circumcision art a trans- 
gressor of the law? For he is not a Jew, which is 
one outwardly; neither is that circumcision, which 
is outward in the flesh; but he is a Jew, which is 
one inwardly ; and circumcision is that of the heart, 
in the spirit, not in the letter ; whose praise is not of 
men, but of God." 

And then to drive home his charge he brings the 
testimony of the Jewish Scriptures against them. 
These prophets whose writings they were accus- 
tomed to read and respect, he says have told the 
same story about Jewish people. 

" There is none righteous, no, not one ; 

There is none that understandeth, 

There is none that seeketh after God ; 

They have all turned aside, they are together be- 
come unprofitable; 

There is none that doeth good, no, not so much 
as one; 

Their throat is an open sepulchre ; 

With their tongues they have used deceit: 

The poison of asps is under their lips ; 



20 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness : 
Their feet are swift to shed blood : 
Destruction and misery are in their ways : 
And the way of peace have they not known : 
There is no fear of God before their eyes. ,, 

It is evident then that on the basis of personal 
merit no one is justified. " Every mouth is 
stopped " ; all have " come short," and hence all 
are under condemnation. 

So far then we have followed his argument. 
Look back over it, and transpose it into modern 
key ; what does it say to us ? 

We are all judged by the light we have zuithin 
our reach. You noticed as you read the charge 
against the Roman common people that he said, 
" that which is known of God is manifested in them, 
so they are without excuse." The invisible quali- 
ties of God are manifest. Those Roman moralists 
were guilty in double degree because they claimed to 
know, but did not do ; and so the Jewish people were 
superlatively guilty, because they had the light of 
nature and the light of philosophy crowned with the 
light of the God-given law. None was condemned 
without being guilty of " holding down the truth." 

The very essence of sin is in the attitude of heart 
toward God. The vital principle of it — the poison- 
ous root of all — is not some violation of a com- 
mandment, not the commission of some dishonor- 
able act. It is not lying, or stealing, or swearing. 



Every Man's Need of the Gospel 21 

These are bad, but one may stop all these and not 
touch the root of evil. Dan Crawford, in his book, 
" Thinking Black/' tells about a native who had 
been stealing. The penalty was to have the hand 
that stole cut off. But the negro said, " It was not 
my hand that stole, it was my heart." The essence 
of sin is in the attitude of heart toward God. See 
how the best teachers have shown this. David said, 
" Against thee and thee only have I sinned." 
When Jesus came he taught that he that hateth his 
brother is a murderer, and he that lusteth is an 
adulterer. So here Paul locates the trouble in the 
heart. Who " knowing God, did not glorify him 
as God, neither were thankful." Out of that root 
grew the things that blacken the chapter. The ger- 
minal evil is in that unthankful attitude. From 
that first step dowmvard the course leads with in- 
creasing ease and speed to utter godlessness. It 
is not difficult to see how such an attitude contains 
the possibility of all wickedness. If one does not 
in his thinking exalt into the rightful superinten- 
dency of his life the Being that has created and 
keeps us — does not glorify him as God (and the 
word " God " is the symbol of goodness and au- 
thority) — then there is no responsibility to any one 
or anything outside oneself. That means that our 
fleshly desires and our human ambitions are the only 
regulators of our conduct. It is a short step from 
that to the worship of the creature, and the sur- 
render of life to the strongest passions. 



22 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

I am not saying that every man who is ungrate- 
ful is low and licentious; but I say that unless a 
man puts the authority of God over his life he has 
no chart, or compass, or safe pilot on board his ship. 
To deny the authority of God is treason. To refer 
all things to the inner self is practical atheism. 
General Grant, when he was lying on that dying 
bed at Mt. McGregor, with the dawn of the next 
world already appearing, wrote an article about his 
feelings concerning the war; and in it he wrote, 
" I am glad to live to see the North and the South 
united " — and then as he reread his page he crossed 
out the word " glad " and wrote over it the word 
" thankful." That was a great change. Thankful 
is a pregnant word. It implies the giver and the 
gift. No man can be " thankful " to a tree or to 
" Nature." Out of that word there shines the face 
of God, the Father Almighty, and if there be 
no gratitude, there is no God glorified as God, and 
hence there is the root of all moral anarchy. 

Our criticism of others is the measure of our 
responsibility. " Wherein thou judgest another 
thou condemnest thyself." " Reckonest thou this, 
O man who judgest them that practise such things, 
and doest the same, that thou shalt escape the judg- 
ment of God ? " There is in our country a very 
high idea of what the Christian church ought to be 
and to do. The whole community is instructed, 
and is correct in its judgment. It is a good condi- 
tion to have. It makes great things possible. But 



Every Mans Need of the Gospel 23 

that high estimate is the standard by which the 
community must be judged. I have often wished 
that I could daily live as nobly and as kindly as the 
saloon-keepers say I ought to. I confess that I 
owe them considerable for the high demands they 
make upon me. But much as I owe them, their 
estimate of my duty will be a stone about their 
necks when they go into the waters of judgment un- 
less they conform to it themselves. Our standard 
for others becomes God's standard for us. 

Judged by these tests no man has a flawless 
record. Making all allowance for our necessary 
ignorances, it yet remains true that, judged by the 
holy law of God, or by the relations that we have to 
him, we all belong to the " shortcoming " class. 
We may struggle against our sins, but in vain. 
The lament of Paul is ours. " For we know that 
the law is spiritual ; but I am carnal, sold under sin. 
For that which I do I know not: for not what I 
would, that do I practise; but what I hate, that I 
do. But if what I would not, that I do, I consent 
unto the law that it is good. So now it is no more 
I that do it, but sin which dwelleth in me. For I 
know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no 
good thing: for to will is present with me, but to 
do that which is good is not. For the good which 
I would I do not, but the evil which I would not, 
that I practise. But if what I would not, that I do, 
it is no more I that do it, but sin which dwelleth in 
me. I find then the law, that to me who would do 



24 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

good, evil is present. For I delight in the law of 
God after the inward man; but I see a different 
law in my members, warring against the law of my 
mind, and bringing me into captivity under the law 
of sin which is in my members. O wretched man 
that I am ! who shall deliver me out of the body of 
this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our 
Lord. So then I myself with the mind serve the 
law of God : but with the flesh the law of sin." So 
that every excuse we might raise is vain. There is 
not a day of our life of which we can say, I will 
trust my future on the record of that day. It does 
not become us to assume an injured air and simply 
resent the accusation. It is not man's judgment 
of us. If it were, it would have little weight. 
Paul said : " It is a small thing that I be judged 
of you, or of man's judgment, yea, I judge not mine 
own self. For I know nothing against myself. 
Yet am I not hereby justified. But he that judgeth 
me is the Lord " (i Cor. 4 : 3, 4). This judgment 
is passed upon us in view of the facts as our own 
consciousness must see them. 

Every mouth is stopped, and on a legal basis all 
are guilty before God. No personal merit, and no 
inherited status, can avail. On the basis of law we 
are under condemnation. The consequences are 
being experienced now, and the final results, though 
delayed, are sure. If we go trusting to any merit 
of our own, we go out under the skies a company 
of guilt-laden men and women. 



CHAPTER III 

EVERY MAN'S SUPPLY 

"Justified freely by his grace through the redemp- 
tion." — Rom. 3 : 24. 

After Paul has shown that en the basis of personal 
fulfilment of law every one comes short, and " every 
mouth is stopped," and " every one guilty before 
God," he comes in his imagination where he sees 
before him a world needing help, and finding none. 
But God — his God and the world's God — does not 
leave mankind to their fate. God's desire to have 
men right with him is far greater than any man's 
desire to be so. Men are estopped from complaint, 
because while they know, they fail to do. But 
God's mouth is not estopped from a word of coun- 
sel and hope for every man. During all the ages 
there has been a way to have the account settled 
between the man and his Maker. This way has 
been contained in the law-books of the Old Testa- 
ment and in the writings of prophets. Romans 
were familiar with these. (See Acts 15 : 21.) And 
then, as if he saw that his readers were in an ex- 
pectant frame of mind, waiting to hear more defi- 
nitely what "way" was thus pointed to by the 
Scriptures, he continues, " justified freely by his 

25 



26 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

grace through the redemption that is in Christ 
Jesus." 

In that sentence is contained the soteriology of 
the New Testament crystallized. If we take any 
one of its several ideas, and trace its origin, and 
its purpose, and its effects, we shall find that it 
contains what accounts for all that is said about the 
various phases of the Christian life. Since this 
statement is a general one and not limited to Ro- 
mans, we may consider it as if it were written di- 
rectly to us. There are four elements. These let 
us examine separately. 

"Justified." We are met here by two quite di- 
verse views of what Paul meant. One view is that 
to be " justified " meant " to be made just." It is 
said that the phrase might be translated "being 
righteoused." That is, we are made good people 
" freely by his grace." The kindness of God so 
works upon us that we forsake our ingratitudes and 
our wrong-doings, and become grateful and obe- 
dient. This view makes " justification " to be a 
subjective improvement in life. 1 

The other view is that to be " justified " is not 
to have an improvement in our life, but in our rela- 
tions to God. It amounts to our word " acquitted." 
The " justified " man is one whom the judge de- 
clares to have met the requirements of the law, so 
that now so far as the law is concerned he is guilt- 
less. In explaining this men have gone beyond 

1 See BushnelPs " Vicarious Sacrifice." 



Every Man's Supply 27 

the statement of Paul and have said that men are 
justified because Jesus bore the guilt and " penalty " 
of our sins, and therefore men are released from 
the law in the same way that they are released from 
a debt when another man pays it. 

A not infrequent illustration of that view is the 
case of Mr. A, a drafted man, who has furnished 
a substitute, and the substitute has been killed. 
They say the draft law has no claims on Mr. A, 
for constructively he has died. He is legally dead. 
For myself, while admitting that these illustrations 
express some truth, I think that the more thor- 
oughly one studies them the less will he be satisfied 
with them. It appears to me that the true inter- 
pretation lies neither in making men just, nor in 
substitution of Christ and the imputation of our 
guilt to him and of his death to us. I would state 
my own view like this : 

Paul is writing to Romans whose common mode 
of thinking and speaking is in the terms of a court. 
Whatever idea he seeks to convey must be con- 
veyed in language they would understand. The 
idea he was seeking to convey was that under a 
regime of law and personal merit men are all crim- 
inals. But, he says, there is a way whereby the 
relations to God of these criminals can be restored, 
and that is by faith in Christ. He does not at- 
tempt to explain, nor to philosophize how the death 
of Christ secures that end. His one aim is to get 
them to accept Christ: and he does not enter into 



28 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

discussions about " imputation " of guilt or of right- 
eousness. His thought is, " O ye who, when you es- 
timate your personal merit, see and feel yourselves 
hopeless, know that your relations to your God 
can be so adjusted that you will stand acquitted." 
That must be our emphatic message when we try 
to reproduce his thought. 

But while Paul does not discuss the philosophy 
of justification here, we find ourselves instinctively 
doing so, and it will not be extraneous if we con- 
sider that matter for a little here. 

As I conceive it, the view of Doctor Bushnell, 
summarized above, fails to be in harmony with 
Paul's thought in this particular: Paul in his allu- 
sions to justification always speaks of something 
that has an immediate effect. When men have 
truly believed in Christ, something has been done 
that settles the past and opens the way for a new 
order of life. In the sixth chapter we get that 
idea. " We are buried with Christ by baptism into 
his death — that like as Christ was raised up from 
the dead ... so we also should walk in newness of 
life." That is his explanation of the symbolism of 
baptism. It is not a gradual dying to the old rela- 
tions that is symbolized, but an accomplished death. 
We do not bury people alive even though they are 
feeble. These people were conceived of as being 
dead to their old relations and therefore to be 
buried. 2 

2 See also Rom. 5 : 1 and 8 : 1. 



Every Man's Supply 29 

It is true that a real justification will open the 
way to a real transformation of character — that is, 
to an actual " righteousing " — but it seems to me 
that Paul's invariable conception of justification is 
that it is an accomplished transaction, not a pro- 
gressive life. If we take Bushnell's view, we find 
that the facts of life contradict us ; for the believers 
are still very far from being actually " righteoused." 

On the other hand, I cannot see anything under- 
standable or acceptable in the theory that my guilt 
and my penalty were placed upon Christ, or that 
Christ's holiness is imputed to me in any way that 
involves a substitution of his holiness for mine, or 
of his suffering for what was due to me. That 
view of the theory of atonement finds no foothold 
in my consciousness or my reason. Some years 
ago in a Southern State a very wicked negro was 
sentenced to be hung for murder. He had a very 
pious brother who was a preacher of the gospel. 
This brother wrote the governor, saying that his 
criminal brother, if hung, would lose his soul, but 
if he could be spared, he might become a good man, 
and he, the brother, therefore asked to be allowed 
to take his brother's place on the gallows, for he 
was a Christian and a saved man. Now if the 
governor had assented, he would not only have 
been without legal warrant for doing so, but pub- 
lic sentiment would have cried out against him as a 
murderer. There could not have been a transfer 
of guilt or penalty. 



30 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

What would be ethically wrong among men can- 
not be right in God. I should be compelled to give 
up all my faith in Christian doctrine were it de- 
pendent on what to me is morally impossible. But 
my faith is not thus dependent. In my own think- 
ing there is a kind of imputation, confirmed by 
every-day experience which is our heritage in 
Christ. 

I knew an English workman in Cincinnati who 
by careful economy and constant industry kept a 
comfortable home. One day a young man from 
London came to him, bringing a letter from a for- 
mer companion in the choir of the London church, 
saying, " This is my son, help him for my sake, and 
the sake of old times." He took the boy in to 
home and heart. He proved to be worthless and 
lazy. But that workman, hoping to save him, shel- 
tered and fed the son for his father's sake. That 
is, he imputed to the son the character of his father. 
Within the halo of love that surrounded the father 
this young man seemed to be worthy. The fa- 
ther's worthiness became the son's worthiness by 
the imputation of association. 

So I take it, one may, without violence to reason 
or experience, think of the worthiness of Christ 
as being a sort of overshadowing worthiness for 
all who by faith associate themselves with him. In 
that sense he becomes our righteousness, the halo 
about him glorifying us. He suffered for our bene- 
fit, but not in our place. He bore our sins in the 



Every Man's Supply 31 

way he bore our sicknesses as recorded in Matthew 
8 : 17. With this view I can see the meaning 
of all the passages that are really connected with 
the subject, although they may not directly dis- 
cuss it. 

And with such a view comes great comfort of 
soul. When one feels, as one must often feel, 
how unworthy he is, he thinks, " I do not stand 
alone, I am associated by faith with one whose 
worthiness overshadows me." And when one asks 
himself what the future may have in store for him, 
he does not begin to reckon up his own merits, but 
he thinks, " What the Father thinks of the Son, 
and what he will do for him, measures what he 
thinks of me and will do for me." And what Jesus 
has undertaken to do with me may be reckoned as 
already accomplished. So that potentially I am 
" made complete." 

So without ethical violence we urge all to seek 
by faith to be so united to Christ that through this 
kind of imputation they may be now justified. 3 

" Freely!' We have a use of the word " freely " 
that conveys the meaning " abundantly." Probably 
this use comes from the fact that we usually take 

3 " Following the example of St. Paul, and St. John, and the writer 
of the Epistle to the Hebrews we speak of something in this great 
sacrifice as ' propitiation.' We believe the Holy Spirit spoke through 
these writers, and it was his will that we should use this word. But 
it is a word which we must leave it to him to interpret. We drop 
our plummet into the depth, but the line attached to it is too short, 
and it does not touch the bottom. The awful processes of the divine 
mind we cannot fathom. Sufficient for us to know that through the 
virtue of one sacrifice our sacrifices are accepted, the barrier which 
sin places between us and God is removed." (Sanday, " International 
Com. on Romans," p. 94.) 



32 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

abundantly what we can get without cost. But the 
meaning here is not that. It is equivalent to " with- 
out cost." It is in the Greek " dorean!' We have 
the same word in Matthew 10 : 8, where Jesus tells 
his disciples as they go out to preach, " Freely ye 
have received, freely give." That is, this message I 
have given you costs you nothing, give it to others 
without cost. In another place (John 15 : 25) we 
read, " They hated me without a cause," that is, 
with nothing to justify it. Again we read in 
Acts 2 : 38, " Ye shall receive the gift of the Holy 
Spirit." Under these and many other such there 
is one common idea, namely, that the thing given 
was given entirely without reference to any sort of 
compensating return either before or after the gift 
was made. I emphasize this because it is after all 
the very essential point in all Paul's argument, as it 
is in our day the most difficult to see correctly. The 
original source of the gift is stated to be the grace 
of God. Out of his own kind and loving heart 
there sprang " as acorn springs from oak " the way 
of life as Paul taught it. Or to use the phrase of 
Philip Doddridge : 

Grace first contrived the way 

To save rebellious man; 
And all the steps that grace display 

Which drew the wondrous plan. 

It was necessary for this fact to be driven home by 
all and by every means because it was a time when 



Every Man's Supply 33 

the idea of the opposite belief prevailed. In all the 
idolatrous world and in all the polytheistic world 
the notion held sway that the gods were to be pro- 
pitiated in some way. Their favor was to be ob- 
tained by some sort of gift or some — what we in 
modern politics call — " pull " with the more power- 
ful one. " All their rule was not one of justice or 
beneficence, but of caprice. Their favor was pur- 
chased by hecatombs, 4 and their hatred incurred by 
acts that had no moral quality that should give of- 
fense to an upright judge." If any one had in any 
way incurred the displeasure of the god or if he felt 
the need of something from the god, he must take 
some kind of gift to the god. There were no free 
passes. Homer relates in the Iliad how the priest of 
the god, Phoebus Apollo, went to the Greek chief- 
tains to ask for his daughter who had been taken 
from him in war. He offered a large ransom, but 
was insolently refused. But after a quarrel among 
the chiefs, Agamemnon yielded and 

. . . bade upon the sea 
Launch a swift bark, with twenty chosen men 
To ply the oars, and put a hecatomb 
Upon it for the God. 

—Bryant, "Iliad" Bk. I, line 185. 

At the end of the journey the offering was pre- 
sented and the messengers said : 

* Offerings of one hundred beasts. 



34 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

O, Chryses ! Agamemnon king of men 

Sends me in haste to bring again this maid to thee, 

And offer up this hallowed hecatomb 

To Phoebus for the Greeks, that so the God 

Whose wrath afflicts us sore may be appeased. 

— Ibid., line 550. 
After the sacrifice and the feast they 

Sang to appease the God ; they chanted forth 

High anthems to the Archer of the skies. 

He listened to the strains and his stern mood 

Was softened. TU .-, r „■ „ 

— Ibid., line 595. 

That fairly represents the polytheistic thought of 
gods. Among the Hebrews that conception had a 
very strong hold. It is recorded that when Saul 
was in a hurry to go out to fight the Philistines he 
did not think it safe to go until he had " entreated 
the favor of Jehovah." He was so eager about it 
that he did not wait for the priest but made the 
offering himself. On this account the prophet told 
him that he had " done foolishly," and that his king- 
dom would not continue. (1 Sam. 13 : 13.) When 
Jonah was in the ship tossed in a storm, the sailors 
said to him: "What meanest thou, O sleeper? 
Arise and call upon thy God, if so be that he will 
think upon us and that we do not perish " (Jonah 
1:6). In the Psalms provided for the temple 
worship we have expressions like the following: 

"Who shall sojourn in thy tabernacle? Who 
shall dwell in thy holy hill? He that walketh up- 



Every Man's Supply 35 

rightly and worketh righteously ; . . . He that doeth 
these things shall never be moved " (Ps. 15 : 1-5). 
" Their sorrows shall be multiplied that give gifts 
for another god. Their drink offerings will not I 
offer, nor take their names upon my lips" (Ps. 

16: 4 ). 

" Bring an offering, and come into his courts " 
(Ps. 96 : 8). 

" I was also perfect with him, and I kept myself 
from mine iniquity. Therefore hath Jehovah rec- 
ompensed me according to my righteousness, ac- 
cording to the cleanness of my hands in his eye- 
sight " (Ps. 18 : 21, 24). 

" The Lord strengthen thee out of Zion ; remem- 
ber all thy offerings, and accept thy burnt sacri- 
fices " (Ps. 20 : 2, 3). 

" Blessed is he that considereth the poor. Jeho- 
vah will deliver him in the day of evil. He will 
preserve him, and keep him, alive, and he shall be 
blessed upon the earth. Jehovah will support him 
upon the couch of languishing" (Ps. 41 : 1-3). 

We are not to understand that this taint of poly- 
theistic character dominates the Psalms ; for it does 
not. But the traces of it are seen in them. 

In the historical books of the Old Testament we 
have one continuous record of the struggle of the 
best men to shake off from the nation this notion 
that God is more to be served by men as a condi- 
tion of his favor than men are to be blessed by him 
as a result of their unbounded faith in him. 



36 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

As an example : " I have had enough of the burnt 
offerings of rams and the fat of fed beasts. I de- 
light not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or 
of he goats. When ye come to appear before me, 
who hath required this of your hands, to trample 
my courts ? Bring no more vain oblations, incense 
is an abomination unto me" (Isa. 1 : n-13). 

Or note the words of Malachi : " A son honoureth 
his father, and a servant his master: if then I be 
a father, where is mine honour ? and if I be a mas- 
ter, where is my fear? saith the Lord of hosts unto 
you, O priests, that despise my name. And ye say, 
Wherein have we despised thy name ? Ye offer pol- 
luted bread upon mine altar. And ye say, Wherein 
have we polluted thee? In that ye say, The table 
of the Lord is contemptible. And when ye offer the 
blind for sacrifice, it is no evil ! and when ye offer 
the lame and sick, it is no evil ! Present it now unto 
thy governor ; will he be pleased with thee ? or will 
he accept thy person? saith the Lord of hosts. And 
now, I pray you, entreat the favour of God, that he 
may be gracious unto us: this hath been by your 
means: will he accept any of your persons? saith 
the Lord of hosts. Oh that there were one among 
you that would shut the doors, that ye might not 
kindle fire on mine altar in vain ! I have no plea- 
sure in you, saith the Lord of hosts, neither will I 
accept an offering at your hand" (Mai. 1 : 6-10). 



CHAPTER IV 

JUSTIFICATION 

In Paul's time the matter had been much refined. 
All connection with polytheistic religion was gone 
from Israel. And it does not appear that they 
considered God as a being of half pagan character, 
having sensuous qualities that must be ministered 
unto. He was a spiritual being, dwelling in all 
the heavens, and ruling over all the earth. But the 
idea possessed the leading teachers of the nation 
that the observing of ceremonial commands, and 
the performing of various acts of worship, all un- 
der the regulation of the ceremonial code, were 
necessary for Israel to retain the favor of God, as 
well as for Gentile peoples to come into the charmed 
circle of his favorites. To put it in the words of 
Paul, they considered that salvation was obtained 
by " works." And " works " meant things done to 
please God and to fill up certain essential require- 
ments of holiness. The man who did these 
" works " abundantly had a better standing with 
God than the man who did them sparingly. 

The idea of propitiating God by such things was 
much more refined than the idea of feeding the 
gods, but at the core there was a common error, 
namely, God gives his favor in return for things 

37 



38 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

done to him. There is a certain " quid pro quo " 
about it in both cases. 

In a much more refined degree the same idea 
now is too common to make Paul's teaching un- 
necessary. We often hear people say, "I do not 
know what I have done to merit such misfortune." 
" I have served the church many years, and why 
should I now suffer ? " "I have given my tenth, 
and yet I am in hard luck." " If you give a tenth 
you will be prospered. " " The Lord loveth a cheer- 
ful giver." And the implication is, he does not 
love the other kind of givers. A common argu- 
ment by Roman Catholics is : " Our religion is the 
truest because it is the hardest. It costs us more 
to be good Catholics than it does you to be good 
Protestants." Others say, " If I turn over a new 
leaf and begin to do what I ought, I will be all 
right." These and similar things all have the error 
that Paul combated tainting much that is otherwise 
good about them. 

With this as a background, let us now see what 
Paul's idea is. He is not discussing the value of 
" works " as a part of the Christian life. He wrote 
to the Ephesians that they were " created in Christ 
Jesus for good works, which God had foreordained 
that they should walk in them" (Eph. 2 : 10). 

He is talking about "justification"; that is, 
about how men who were sinful before God were 
to have their relations to him set right preparatory 
to having their living right. It was the same kind 



Justification 39 



of question that the prodigal must have asked be- 
fore he returned to his father. " What/' he 
thought, " shall I be required to do, or what shall 
I say to get my father's consent to work on the old 
farm again ? " That is a very different question 
from the one he would ask after he was restored 
to his father's bosom and was at work on the old 
farm. Then it would be, " How can I gratefully 
serve so loving a father, who has so graciously for- 
given me all my ingratitudes ? " He was not re- 
stored for the sake of his good works, but he 
sought to do good works because he had been re- 
stored. His idea was, " I am not worthy to be 
called thy son, but if you will let me be a servant 
I will work for my board." His father freely for- 
gave him and restored him. " Justified him freely 
by his grace." 

The justification is not of works; it is free; but 
not so the sanctification. This latter costs effort 
and sacrifice and suffering perhaps. But justifica- 
tion is God's act on his own terms, and the terms 
are " freely by his grace." 

Although the Jewish leaders in Paul's time were 
students of the Old Testament they blindly over- 
looked the greatest fact in those prophetic books of 
which they were so proud. " Ho, every one that 
thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath 
no money; come ye, buy and eat; yea, come, buy 
wine and milk without money, and without price " 
(Isa. 55 : 1). " He will feed his flock like a shep- 



40 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

herd, he will gather the lambs in his arms, and carry 
them in his bosom" (Isa. 40 : 11). " The Lord 
is my shepherd; I shall not want" (Ps. 23 : 1). 
These are but examples of hundreds of passages 
uttered during several centuries by prophets in suc- 
cession having the central thought that Israel was 
the people of God because he chose them for his 
own. They were to obey him and love him, it is 
true, but the initiatory act was by him, and that 
initiation grew out of his grace, not out of their 
goodness. " Propitiation " cannot therefore mean 
to make him kindly disposed, for he " sent his Son " 
to save the world when in spirit and act the world 
was hostile. 

And in these days it will not be thought irrele- 
vant to glance at the world outside of the Bible. 
All the things of God are of grace; that is, they 
come to us without price. For example: How 
much rent does the farmer pay God for the use of 
the infinite forces of nature? He sows a little 
wheat, and at once earth and air spring to his ser- 
vice. While he sleeps they work for him. They 
perfect his crop. When it is ripe he harvests, 
grinds, and eats it. 

How much does the gardener pay for the ex- 
quisite taste and tireless industry of the forces of 
chemistry and light that fashion and color and per- 
fume the flowers that beautify his garden? 

These astonishing activities of electricity, which 
are revolutionizing the commerce of the world — 



Justification 41 



how much rent to God do they pay who thus draft 
these forces as willing helpers for themselves ? 

Nay, how much do any of us pay to God for the 
life forces that make our hearts throb and our 
functions continue — for our life itself ? 

All these are freely given to us. We neither 
can, nor are we asked to pay for them. 

Earth gets its price for what Earth gives us; 
The beggar is taxed for a corner to die in, 
The priest has his fee who comes and shrives us, 
We bargain for the graves we lie in ; 
At the devil's booth are all things sold, 
Each ounce of dross costs its ounce of gold; 
For a cap and bells our lives we pay, 
Bubbles we buy with a whole soul's tasking: 
'Tis heaven alone that is given away, 
'Tis only God may be had for the asking ; 
No price is set on the lavish summer; 
June may be had by the poorest comer. 

— Lowell. 

In matters of our relation to the one God all 
have the same conditions. As rain falls without 
cost, as sun shines on us gratis, so justification is 
freely given us out of the grace of God. No man 
has any more need to pray that God will be kind 
to him than he has to pray that God will let the 
sun shine in his windows. What he has need to 
do is to open the window. " God so loved the 
world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that 
whosoever believeth on him might not perish " 
(John 3 : 16). He is not to be made propitious; 



42 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

he is propitious. He is not to be persuaded ; we are 
to be persuaded. We are not to ransom ourselves ; 
he has ransomed us. 

" Through the redemption/' Two great ideas are 
compressed into this one word " redemption/' The 
word itself is related closely to the slave-market. 
It brings to mind a kind man going into the mart 
for slaves and by exchange or purchase securing 
the liberty of some one held in bondage. The real 
emphasis is not on the method by which he secures 
the freedom but on the fact that he secures it. 
Both the onlooker and the slave himself, in the joy 
of the freedom attained, might not even remember 
how it was secured. It would not matter who had 
owned the slave, nor what he did with the money. 
So in this case it is not worth while to inquire to 
whom the " redemption " value was given, nor what 
became of it afterward. It is the freedom from 
condemnation that interests us. It is the " redemp- 
tion " that Christ secured rather than the one from 
whom he secured it. 

Paul has said that the justification is without cost 
to us, but not so to him that secured it. It is free 
to us through the redemption that he wrought. 

The specific effect of that " act of redemption " 
in the divine economy no one knows. It has been 
discussed pro and con for nineteen centuries with- 
out settlement. But that it removed all that stood 
in the path of a free justification for us none deny. 
And without that " act of redemption " Paul 



Justification 43 



thought — and all who accept him still think — -that 
no justification could be attained. 

Christ Jesus was set forth — exhibited openly — 
before the world as the " propitiation " for our sins. 
He by his whole life from birth to ascension accom- 
plished what was necessary to make the justification 
free to us although with great cost to himself. 

The great majority of writers on the subject feel 
constrained to say that the death of Christ had a 
substitutionary character, that the blood — standing 
for the death — of Jesus was a vicarious penalty for 
the sins of the world. Their arguments have great 
weight. It is quite possible that Paul, who had 
been brought up with the sacrificial ideas always 
before him, had this conception or one that took 
that direction. There is, however, enough on the 
other side to give me confidence to say that I can- 
not find any basis in my own heart nor any sure 
ground in Paul's language on which to base that 
view. I am in this matter an agnostic. 

I prefer to understand propitiation to mean 
the meeting-place for men and God. When men 
differ and fall out a reconciliation is brought about 
by meeting at the house of a friend. When nations 
war and then seek peace, conference is had on 
some intermediate or neutral ground. 1 So I think 

1 In 1807 a raft was anchored in the middle of the river Memel 
at Tilsit. Napoleon went out to it in a skiff from the south, and 
Alexander the Russian czar came to it from the north, and there 
the treaty of Tilsit was made and signed which united France and 
Russia against England. — (Poultney Bigelow, " German Struggle for 
Liberty," Vol. I, p. 92.) 



44 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

the old sacrifices were not substitutionary. They 
were confessional. " A remembrance of sin " was 
made. They were consecrative in that they were 
the symbol of surrender. And in them God and the 
sinner met together to secure peace. So it seems 
to me the sinner comes to Christ, yields life and 
faith to him. God on the other side is " in Christ 
reconciling us to himself." Christ is therefore the 
" hilasterion " — the meeting-place — where we may 
be reconciled to God. 

Thus we have the Gospel of God stated in Roman 
forms of speech : " Being justified freely by his 
grace, through, the redemption that is in Christ 
Jesus, whom God set forth to be a propitiation for 
our sins." 

As at the outset of this chapter I said it is the 
gospel in crystal, so I repeat we have here what 
constitutes for the one who sincerely accepts it a 
whole body of Christian doctrine and a flowing 
fountain of Christian hope. 

May all who read this come to possess it. 
Quite likely my explanation may not satisfy all. 
But it is not necessary to agree with me. The 
important thing is that men accept Christ as their 
leader, teacher, helper, redeemer, Saviour. He will 
fill for each what the real need now is, and will 
crown his work for them, we believe, by a glorious 
resurrection and an inheritance of eternal life 
beyond. 



CHAPTER V 

THE RESULTS OF JUSTIFICATION 

"Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace 
with God through our Lord Jesus Christ: by whom also 
we have access by faith into this grace wherein we 
stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not 
only so, but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that 
tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; 
and experience, hope; and hope maketh not ashamed; 
because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts 
by the Holy Ghost, which is given unto us. For when 
we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died 
for the ungodly." — Rom. 5 : 1-6. 

In central Vermont, when a farmer sees breaking 
out from the ledges of rock in his pasture white or 
whitish veins, he at once thinks of marble. It may 
be that his farm is but the covering of quarries 
that will make him rich. So he bores or blasts 
down into the earth to discover whether his con- 
jectures are well founded. Some men have found 
fortunes thus lying in wait for the man who would 
discover them. When I see one of Paul's " there- 
fores " I am reminded of such men. It tells me 
that under the word there lies a truth well worth 
studying for. It tells me that he has laid a train 
of thought preparatory to his word and that 
now the treasure is ready to be uncovered. Such 

45 



46 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

a case is here in this passage. Up to this point he 
has been stating the way of being justified. It is 
by faith in Christ. Now the sinner is conceived of 
as one whose account has been settled with the 
Judge. What follows from this settlement? Being 
justified by faith — that is having been justified — 
what are the results? He replies in the words of 
this passage. Let us examine it 

" We have peace with God!' We find two mean- 
ings ascribed to this by scholars of merit. One, as 
given in the Roman Catholic and in the Bible 
Union versions, makes it read " Let us have peace/' 
as if it were an exhortation to be at peace. 

This does not meet my view of the whole passage. 
It would not be consistent, after a man has been 
discharged by the judge, to say, " Now be at peace 
with him." The peace is already declared. 

The other view makes it read — as in the King 
James and in the Standard versions — " We have 
peace with God " ; and then Paul goes on to mention 
some of the results of that peace. 

It is also to be noted that the peace he speaks of 
is the peace of relations to God, not the peace of 
heart that is meant by Paul in another place where 
he says, " The peace of God that passeth all un- 
derstanding keep your hearts and minds" (Phil. 
4:7). That kind of peace is ours to seek for, 
but it is not what is in his thought here. Rather 
is this the thought : Heretofore the sinner has been 
unwilling to do what his Creator and Father de- 



The Results of Justification 47 

sired him to do. In greater or less degree he was 
in a disobedient frame of mind. Technically he 
was a rebel at war with God. His life was an 
endeavor to go contrary to the current of God's 
plans for him. He was trying to row up the stream. 
But now he has swung into the current and moves 
with it unresistingly. Now his war is ended. He 
has accepted the way of God and walks in it. In 
that sense he is at peace with God. It is God's 
purpose that all men shall become followers of 
Jesus. To him every knee is to bow, and every 
tongue confess that he is Lord. Until one has done 
that, he is in an antagonistic attitude to God. When 
he has done that, he is at peace. Instead of being 
a company of those whom God is seeking to recon- 
cile, Christian people are become a company of 
those who are reconciled to him and his way. 

And how rich are the associations of that word 
" peace " ! I remember how in '65 when our boys 
were away in the army the word came that the war 
was over. Lee had surrendered. Then, as if by 
common instinct, all the village went out into the 
street. The sextons rang the church-bells. The 
country people came hurrying into the village. The 
boys kindled a big bonfire. The village orators 
made speeches of rejoicing. Peace had come! If 
we should hear such a word now the whole world 
would be moved with gratitude and praise. 1 

1 Since these words were written, all the world has been thrilled 
by the news of peace, and all the world has sung songs of praise. 



48 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

While that is more outwardly expressive, it would 
not be more inwardly blessed than the rest that 
comes to a man's soul when he yields at last to the 
invitations of the gospel and commits himself to 
Christ as his Lord and his Saviour. There remains 
much for him to learn and much to overcome ; but 
the antagonism is gone, the anxiety is over. He 
has taken the yoke of Christ upon himself and he 
has found his yoke easy and his burden light. He 
has found " rest unto his soul." He has peace 
with God. 

"Into this grace." Something more than the 
word to " cease firing " has gone forth. There is 
reconstruction to be accomplished now. Paul had 
a sort of geographic imagination. " Into this 
grace " — as if we were in a sort of enclosure, sepa- 
rate from the world, protected from the cold winds 
of fear and the reach of danger. Overhead bend 
the blue skies and radiant glory of God's favor. 
It is a gracious place to be in. Paul's suggested 
idea is that now being at peace with God, we are 
the recipients of many spiritual blessings that can 
be had only " in this grace." If any one hesitates 
to see the exceeding value of being thus " enclosed 
in his grace," let him look about among his more 
intimate friends, and ask whether those who are " in 
this grace " do give evidence of having blessings 
that are not among the other class. Are their ideals 
of life higher and more refined? Do they have a 
calmness in the presence of troubles or danger that, 



The Results of Justification 49 

other things being equal, others fail to possess. 
Have they a hope that is an anchor to their souls 
when storms arise on the ocean of their life that 
holds them stedfast? I think such an observation 
will satisfy the inquiring mind that there are bless- 
ings of that sort reserved only for those who are 
" in this grace." And we may bring it closer home. 
In the case of you who have come " into this 
grace " is it not true that you have had blessings 
since you came into it that were unknown to you 
before? Does not life seem to you more worth 
living? Are there not compensations and conso- 
lations for you as you walk through hard places 
that w r ere wholly unknown before you came " into 
this grace"? 

"Access by faith!' How do men get " into this 
grace " ? " Access by faith," says Paul. It is by 
the submissive committal of ourselves to Christ 
that we are thus favored to enter the enclosure. It 
is the same idea that Jesus taught when he said: 
" I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one 
cometh unto the Father but by me " (John 14 : 6). 
It is the same that Peter preached to the troubled 
souls in Jerusalem at Pentecost : " Repent and be 
baptized in the name of Jesus Christ . . . and ye 
shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit " (Acts 
2 : 38). Faith in Jesus is the doorway to all the 
complete blessings God has in store for us. Not a 
philosophy to be understood; not a holiness to be 
attained by self-discipline ; not a theology to be mas- 



50 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

tered and confessed; but faith in Jesus. This was 
Paul's view in Corinth where he determined to 
know nothing but Jesus and him crucified. ( I Cor. 
2:2.) It was the same when the jailer at Philippi 
sought light. (Acts 16 : 31.) If any man is seek- 
ing to come " into this grace " the only way is faith 
in Jesus. In Antioch the disciples held meetings 
day after day and preached to the people. Paul 
came there and for a whole year taught much 
people. But as they went home from the sessions 
they were asked what he had talked about, and they 
said, " About Christ." When men were planning 
to go and hear him they said, " Let us go and hear 
this man talk about Christ." So persistent were 
the disciples in this that people said, " These people 
are Christians, they talk nothing but Christ." With 
us there is much after faith, but faith is funda- 
mentally necessary as a condition of entering " this 
grace." 

" We rejoice In the hope of the glory of God! 9 
However rich may be the " earnest of our inheri- 
tance," and however luscious the " first-fruits," the 
great bulk of " this grace " remains in the region 
of hope. The present may be ever so blessed, the 
future has much more in store. Peter expressed 
it in this fashion, " God hath begotten us again 
unto a living hope, by the resurrection of Jesus 
Christ from the dead, unto an inheritance incor- 
ruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away, re- 
served in heaven for you who, by the power of God, 



The Results of Justification 51 

are guarded, through faith, unto a salvation ready 
to be revealed in the last time " ( 1 Peter 1 : 3-5 ) . 
" We are saved in hope," wrote Paul. " But hope 
that is seen is not hope ; for what a man seeth, why 
doth he yet hope for it? But if we hope for that 
which we see not, then do we with patience wait for 
it " (Rom. 8 : 24, 25). But we hope for the " glory 
of God." Some read this to mean that we shall see 
the glorious royal state of God. As Jesus said, 
" The Son of man shall come in his glory and all 
the angels with him" (Matt. 25 : 31). Others 
read it to mean that we shall see the " splendor in 
which he lives " (Beet). Another, " We shall share 
in God's glory" (Weymouth). Another, "We 
shall attain the glorious ideal God has for us" 
(Twentieth Century). Jesus said, "I desire that 
they may be with me where I am, that they may 
behold my glory which thou hast given me " (John 
17 : 24). But he also said, " The glory which thou 
hast given me I have given them " (John 17 : 22). 
So I think we may say that Paul's idea includes 
both the vision of God's spiritual splendor, and also 
the sharing of it ourselves ; as John wrote, " We 
shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is " 
(1 John 3 : 2). 

But how impossible it is for us to conceive or to 
express in any satisfactory way the spiritual glory 
for which we look. It must be one of character 
as well as of body. Put together all the highest 
virtues in perfect proportions and in- full measure ; 



52 Transplanted Truths: from Romans 

give us the patience of Job, the faith of Abraham, 
the courage of young David, the insight of Isaiah, 
the zeal of Amos, the enthusiasm of Peter, the ten- 
derness of John, the energy of Paul, and fuse them 
all together with love like that of Jesus, and you 
have the kind of individuals we should be. But the 
future will not be a set of individuals. It will be a 
society. When the writer of Revelation sought to 
give us an idea of the coming glory, he told of a 
city coming down from God out of heaven ! Then, 
with figures that are impossible in fact, he sought 
to tell how that night and sickness and sorrow and 
sighing and death are all banished ; while song and 
love and praise and usefulness are everywhere. 
Such are the sketches in metaphor of the glory of 
God for which we hope. As it has been left to our 
imaginations, we are at liberty to use them to the 
full. The only limit is that we must not allow any 
sin to mar our picture, for the glory of God is the 
beauty of holiness. 

The religion of Confucius is one of memory; that of 
Buddha one of extinction; that of the Stoic one of en- 
durance; that of the Epicurean one of forgetfulness. The 
religion of Christ is one of hope. He regenerates the very 
word. In classic use its meaning was " Expectancy of evil 
or good." In his use it means only future good. It has 
a sure foundation. We are not saved because we hope 
we are. It is not founded upon experience or personal 
attainment. Christianity is founded upon a fact. The 
true hope is in the risen Christ. Criticism, scholarship, 
hate, ridicule, have stormed around that" stone rolled from 



The Results of Justification 53 

the door of the sepulcher, but there it still lies bearing upon 
it the gospel of our hopes. 

The risen Christ is the assurance of a completed service, 
of an accepted sacrifice and a present spirit. If Christ be 
not risen, we may as well pull down our churches and go 
to work again building towers of Babel. Our hope is not 
in that we help God, but that God helps us. " While I live 
I hope " is the proverb of humanity. " While I die I 
hope" is the triumphant chant of grace. 

Eternity we recognize as our inexhaustible treasure- 
house, and through our hope, as through a window, we 
catch glimpses that inspire. Its thought is inspiration; its 
gleam is strength. The golden age is not back yonder, 
but ever before us. We keep our eye on the sun and 
the shadows of earth are kept behind us and our eyes 
glow with the sunlight. When hope fails, the man dies. 
(Rev. Wallace Radcliffe.) 

" We exult in tribulation." Some one may say : 
" Yes it is very well to tell about the glory that is 
coming, but here and now the Christians have per- 
secution and adversity. They have too much re- 
ligion to enjoy the world and too much world to 
enjoy religion." " No," says Paul, " we are not 
cast down by such things. On the other hand we 
exult — we triumph in the midst of tribulations. 
There are fountains open in the heart that overflow 
with help and consolations even when we are suffer- 
ing persecutions." 

All the history of the church has borne witness 
to that. When in 1536 near Antwerp in Germany 
William Tyndale was being burned at the stake for 
printing the Bible for his fellow countrymen, he 



54 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

forgot his sufferings and prayed, " O Lord, open 
the king of England's eyes." When in 1555 in Ox- 
ford, England, Bishop Latimer was burning at the 
stake he said to Ridley who was burning beside 
him : " Play the man, brother. To-day we shall 
light a fire by God's grace that I trust will never be 
put out." Thousands upon thousands have had the 
same kind of help when they have been in circum- 
stance of trial. It is the common faith of the 
church to-day that grace will be given for every 
occasion. And this optimism is needed greatly. 

The war is bringing out a large demand for Christian 
men who are " good fellows " to go to France in the service 
of the Young Men's Christian Association. They are to 
be stationed in the Association centers, to assist in main- 
taining the morale of the army, to serve the soldiers' needs 
in little attentions that army life cannot confer. These 
men are expected to assist in keeping the soldiers clean 
and capable, to encourage and participate in the field 
sports, and to furnish a good example for the men in 
practical and manly Christian living. General Pershing 
has so far recognized the value of this service that he 
has asked for four thousand such leaders who are above 
draft age and physically fitted for the hardships of army 
life. 

In all parts of the country men of the type desired have 
been responding to the call, and doubtless still more are 
wanted and will be wanted until the war is ended. It 
should not be difficult for a Christian nation to furnish 
them in ample numbers. The modern, hale-fellow, out-of- 
doors, glad-he-is-alive variety of man is desired, and the 
United States for some years has been growing this type 
of citizen. 



The Results of Justification 55 

The old-style variety of long-faced, melancholy, de- 
pressing type of Christian has been " going out " for many 
years. It has been sensed that the religion of Christ 
requires no immolation of live manhood or womanhood; 
that a Christian should be a cheerful optimist, with more 
reason for being glad and for distributing gladness than 
the unbeliever. Religion does not require of its adherents 
that they deprive themselves of all human characteristics; 
that they put on sackcloth and ashes and go through life 
sadly bewailing their lot. On the contrary, the Christian 
promise should case-harden them to trouble and make 
them cheerfully ready for whatever the future may bring. 

It is this spirit that General Pershing is conferring 
upon his soldiers, a spirit that even now makes them no- 
ticeable among their brethren of other nations in the 
field. It is this spirit that keeps American troops fine 
and fit and cheerful in any circumstances, and hardens 
not only their will to victory but their physical bodies to 
endurance. — Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 

" Tribulation worketh steadfastness." The reason 
for the exulting is that the very tribulations that 
look so formidable from the outside are active in 
the production of qualities that more peaceful cir- 
cumstances fail to develop. First of all is steadfast- 
ness. That is a great word. We speak of home- 
stead, that is the place of the home ; bedstead is the 
place of the bed; steadfast is place-fast. That is, 
one sticks to his place and his faith. One does not 
know whether he has steadfastness until he has faced 
some storm that would drive him from his anchor- 
age. But when he has faced and defeated tribula- 
tion, he knows his own heart, and others know it. 



56 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

This steadfastness works approval. Mr. Moody 
used to mark passages in his Bible " T & P " ; 
that meant " tried and proved." So the man who 
has suffered for Christ's sake marks his faith 
" T & P "— " tried and proved." 

"And approval hope; and hope maketh not 
ashamed." That is, a hope that will not disappoint 
its possessors. It might be said that : " It is well 
to keep up a cheerful mind in all this trouble; bet- 
ter than to despair ; but after all it is only an opti- 
mistic speculation. We do not know what the real- 
ity of the future may be. It may all turn out to be a 
beautiful mirage, or a rainbow made by faith shin- 
ing through our tears. How do we know ? " We 
know by the fact that now in this present life we 
have the first-fruits, the beginning of what is prom- 
ised. " Well, what is that? Pray tell." It is this : 
The love of God is already shed abroad in our 
hearts. We have now the most evident and satis- 
factory results. We love God whereas we used 
to fear him. We war against the evil desires of the 
flesh which once we served. We cherish a hope 
which once was a stranger to us. Our tempers are 
softened ; our tongues are being tamed ; our bitter- 
nesses are getting sweetened ; our ambitions are get- 
ting more spiritual; our vision of ourselves is en- 
larged and uplifted. We love to read the teachings 
of Jesus. We delight in the company of such as 
worship God. Indeed, in all that is permanent 
about us we may say without exaggeration we are 



The Results of Justification 57 

" new creatures in Christ Jesus." Such are the 
things that guarantee our hope is founded in truth. 
That hope will not put us to shame. 

Such then are the results of being justified by 
faith. We have peace with God, access to God's 
favor, hope of glory, triumph in persecutions, first- 
fruits that give us satisfactory assurance. 

It will be of great service to us if we not infre- 
quently take time to consider and estimate these 
results. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE GREAT COMPENSATION 

"As in Adam all die, so in Christ are all made 
alive." — i Cor. 15 : 22. 

Xenophon reported Homer as saying that Ulysses 
was a " sure orator " because he framed his reason- 
ings on things that are acknowledged by all man- 
kind. It may not be said that Paul always did that ; 
but he framed his reasonings on things that were 
acknowledged by those to whom he wrote. The 
passage we are studying now is one that gives great 
perplexity to many because it rests upon an idea of 
sin and death that finds hostility in many minds. 
The old doctrine of the New England catechism 
that " In Adam's fall we sin-ned all/' awakens 
more hostility than almost any other doctrine of 
the church. I wish to consider this disagreeable 
doctrine as given in this chapter. 

There are two facts to be recognized preliminary 
to an understanding of the passage. First, Paul 
had a very fertile imagination that he used actively 
in illustrating his thought. It has been said of 
Henry Ward Beecher that an abstract, obscure 
idea passed through his mind became luminous by 
his concrete illustrations. Paul was an expert in 
58 



The Great Compensation 59 

that art. It will help us to an understanding of 
this to recall some of his figures. Writing to the 
Corinthians, and wishing to explain his method a 
little, he says, " I have fed you with milk and not 
with meat " (1 Cor. 3:2). Wishing to show them 
that there should be no jealousies among teachers, 
he says : " I planted, Apollos watered ; but God 
gave the increase. He that planteth and he that 
watereth are one" (1 Cor. 3 : 6, 8). Changing 
his figure, he says : " Ye are God's building. I laid 
a foundation, others build thereon. But a day is 
coming when the fire will test the work of each " 
(1 Cor. 3 : 9, 10, 13). When he would tell of the 
moral effects of faith in Christ, he says, " The 
fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace," etc. (Gal. 
5 : 22). When he would tell how the law of Moses 
influenced men to take Christ, he said, " The law 
was a schoolmaster to lead us to Christ" (Gal. 
3 : 24). And perhaps the most striking instance 
of a semidramatism is found in his attempt to teach 
the triumph of Christ over death. He pictures 
Christ as fighting the enemies of his reign in the 
open. One after another of the hostile agencies is 
defeated; for " He must reign until he has put all 
enemies under his feet." And now there remains 
only one more. That is Death — " the last enemy." 
All other forces have been defeated — annihilated 
is the word. Christ stands the master of the world 
except that Death the dread monster remains to 
contend with him and to defeat his plans. Then 

F 



60 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

the trumpet sounds, and Death is forced to own the 
victor. 

The powers of Death have done their worst, 
But Christ their legions hath dispersed. 
Let shouts of holy joy outburst. 

The Prince of life with Death has striven, 
To cleanse the earth his blood has given, 
Has rent the veil and opened heaven. 

One cannot follow his picture with care and an ac- 
tive imagination without having a thrill of personal 
triumph that leads one to say with Paul, " O grave, 
where is thy victory? O Death, where is thy 
sting?" 

The second fact to be considered is that figures 
of speech must not be taken as theological formulae. 
They are the clothing of ideas, not the ideas them- 
selves. 

In this passage (Rom. 5 : 12-21), Paul, to a 
large extent, dramatizes the situation. He has been 
teaching them that we are justified by our vital asso- 
ciation with Jesus. 1 In that associational way his 
excellence is imputed to us; his obedience — even 
unto death — is in some way made to declare the 
righteousness of God in passing over our sins; so 
that he is not subject to the imputation of indiffer- 
ence to sin when he justifies sinners. The whole 
of this teaching rests upon the idea that Christ un- 

1 See page 30. 



The Great Compensation 61 

der some view both in his suffering and his obe- 
dience represents us. 

But that representative idea is the one that Jews 
of his day and many Americans of our day dislike. 
The most subtle antagonism to the gospel makes its 
last defense on this point of imputation. Paul said 
he sought his " own righteousness." The Jews 
sought " to establish their own righteousness " and 
did not " subject themselves to the righteousness 
of God" (Rom. 10 : 3). The whole desire for 
" works " was based upon the subtle, semiuncon- 
scious desire to be independent of God. This same 
subtle antagonism growing out of a mistaken pride 
of personality finds expression in such w r ords as the 
following, from a teacher of Christian theology who 
is — doubtless without hostile intent — led away by 
his philosophical bent into statements that are 
wholly adverse to Paul's teaching. He says : " Man 
is true to the end of his being only in a rational 
^//-guidance. . . We cannot rationally think that a 
rational being can have an end in view that is not 
^//-perfecting " or " that he should find a law out- 
side himself. . . Nor would it be ethical to find 
the principle of one's faith and conduct outside one- 
self." That is religious anarchy. It is not uncom- 
mon to hear Roman Catholics argue that their re- 
ligion is more likely to be true because they make 
greater sacrifices for it than others. If there w r ere 
pilgrimages to be made or heavy burdens imposed, 
many would accept them if, in so doing, they could 



62 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

only have the assurance that they were earning their 
salvation. 

This dislike of being in the halo of anybody's 
goodness and thus being recipients of grace was, 
in the minds of those to whom Paul wrote, a great 
hindrance ; and to all such as now hesitate his word 
is equally unwelcome. But it is worth while to hear 
what he says : 

He calls up in memory the history written in 
Genesis, and with which his readers were all fa- 
miliar, for Moses was read in all their synagogues. 
(Acts 15 : 21.) Here is Adam in the dawn of hu- 
man history standing alone before God. He is 
given a command and great privileges. He sins, 
and as a result death becomes his penalty. But 
Adam is the Begetter of the human race. Their 
moral and physical constitution they inherit from 
him. Their station in the created world they get 
from him. Whether it be for good or for evil, this 
is the fact everywhere evident. " In Adam all 
died " by the operation of the same law that makes 
it certain that in Adam all are men and not mon- 
keys, and no monkeys are men. " Every seed after 
its kind " is a sentence written all over the earth. 
If Adam became a sinner his descendants are sin- 
ners by nature. 

" But," says some one, " all men sin for them- 
selves and they are penalized with death for that." 
No, death is not the penalty for breaking law. 
" Why not? " says the objector. Because under the 



The Great Compensation 63 

regime of law there can be no sin imputed before 
the law is given; the law cannot be retroactive. 
And yet men died during all the ages from Adam 
to Moses before the law was given. And they did 
not die for disobedience of some special command, 
after the manner of Adam. They must therefore 
have been penalized because they were the children 
of Adam. And all his children are included in the 
penalty. So it is evident that the principle of being 
represented by the great Begetter of our race in 
his sin is a living and active one all through the 
ages. Every dying child bears witness to that fact. 
It is not by personal disobedience that death is 
passed upon all men, but by reason of our great 
Begetter Adam's sin. So the principle of heredity 
is established by Paul after the fashion of Ulysses, 
appealing to what every one must acknowledge. 
Paul so far is a true reasoner. 

" But," says some one, " this is a hard saying. 
Does it seem to be just that the children should 
suffer for the sins of the parents? Did not Jere- 
miah, when he saw the happy state of Israel, say 
that ' In those days they will not say, The fathers 
have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth 
are set on edge : but every one shall die for his own 
iniquity. Every man that eateth sour grapes, his 
teeth shall be set on edge ' "? (Jer. 31 : 29, 30.) 

This is the objection to-day to what is called the 
doctrine of " original sin." A large part of the 
objection is due to a misunderstanding of the doc- 



64 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

trine; but the Pauline idea does have the root of a 
great antagonism in it. It seems to us unjust, and 
therefore untrue. For this very reason I think 
Paul makes a long and detailed statement of the 
compensations for Adam that God gives us in 
Christ. He uses the Genesis story, and the confir- 
matory testimony of all observation not as an 
example, but as a parallel to certain things in the re- 
ligious realm. It is " an earthly story with an heav- 
enly meaning." But in using it one must not forget 
that it is an illustration rather than an argument. It 
shows a truth in the physical realm to miniature a 
similar truth in the spiritual realm. So he says, " As 
in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive 
again " (i Cor. 15 : 22). That is by no means say- 
ing that as many as in Adam die shall be alive 
in Christ. It is not a matter of numbers. It is the 
principle of heredity he is setting forth. On the 
same principle by which all those whom Adam be- 
gat shared in his death, all those whom Christ be- 
gets will share in his life. 

So far the comparison is good and complete. But 
then Paul goes on to show that while in that par- 
ticular the cases have a common principle, in the 
gospel scheme in other particulars the case is far 
better. He reverses the figure entirely, and con- 
trasts the good received by grace of heredity with 
the sorrow received by inheritance from- Adam. In 
Adam it was one sin and many sinners ; in Christ it 
was one act of obedience and many made righteous. 



The Great Compensation 65 

In Adam it was unto condemnation; in Christ it 
was unto justification. If physical relation to Adam 
brought forth death, much more will faith relation 
to Christ bring forth life. If justice in God toward 
Adam brought penalty of death, much more will 
the grace of God bring forth riches of good. 

In every way those who are begotten by Christ 
find the operation of the law of heredity working 
abundantly and superabundantly above its working 
in the lower realm in which Adam was the begetter. 

If Jesus Christ — as we are taught — was slain 

From the foundation of the world, it was 

Because our evil lived in essence then — 

Coeval with the great, mysterious fact. 

And he was slain that we might be transformed, — 

Not into Adam's sweet similitude — 

But the more glorious image of himself, — 

A resolution of our destiny 

As high transcending Eden's life and lot 

As he surpasses Eden's fallen lord. 

— /. G. Holland, Bitter Sweet. 

So if at any time one is disposed for a moment 
to antagonize the doctrine of heredity let him recall 
this argument of Paul and see that, mysterious as 
it may be, nevertheless the compensations are ex- 
ceeding abundant. So that, as Paul here says, 
" Where sin abounded, grace did much more 
abound ; that as sin reigned in death, so might grace 
reign through righteousness, unto eternal life, 
through Jesus Christ our Lord." 



66 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

If then any man feels that he is unfortunate in 
having a natural disposition that brings him into 
trouble, let him claim " this grace " in which he 
may " stand, and rejoice in the hope of the glory 
of God." 



CHAPTER VII 

THE DICTIONARY OF FAITH 

"The steps of that faith of our father Abraham." — 
Rom. 4 : 12. 

After Paul has set forth his idea of justification 
in Romans 3 : 21-26, and added the declaration that 
the door is wide open both to Jews and Gentiles 
(Rom. 3 : 30), he knows that some of his readers, 
or some who would hear his letter read in the meet- 
ings of the disciples, would at once begin to examine 
the matter critically. He had been preaching in all 
sorts of places, sometimes in synagogues, at other 
times in market-places, then again in the precincts 
of idol temples ; and just as political speakers among 
us learn by experience what sort of questions men 
ask, and what objections they may raise, and reply 
to them by shaping their addresses beforehand, so 
Paul inserted in his letter replies to the objections 
and questions he felt sure would be in the minds 
of the Roman people to w T hom he wrote. 

One of these objections likely to come from the 
Jewish part of the church was this : " If you say 
that the door is open to all alike, what was the 
special advantage that Abraham, our honored an- 
cestor, possessed ? " His reply may be stated in this 

6 7 



68 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

form : As far as personal " works " go toward jus- 
tification he had nothing to his advantage, for we 
have shown that by works of law no flesh will be 
justified in His sight; and that on the basis of merit 
all men are " shortcomers." The Scripture itself 
tells us that it was his faith, not his " works," that 
was counted to him for righteousness. That state- 
ment must stand unmodified. If he had been 
justified because of his ethical or ceremonial per- 
fectness he would have had a right to claim justifi- 
cation as a legitimate reward for his excellence, just 
as a man who has completed a contract has a right 
to demand his pay. We do not consider that a 
grocer is under obligation to us because we pay for 
the goods he has sold us. Payment is his due and 
our duty, not our grace. David had this in mind 
when he wrote : " Blessed are they whose iniquities 
are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed 
is the man to whom the Lord will not reckon sin." 
Abraham, therefore, was the recipient of " grace " — 
that is, of promises that grew out of the gracious 
disposition of God, not out of the demands of jus- 
tice, or as a reward for his deeds. The word " for- 
giveness " carries that idea as its central message. 
But some one is saying : " Yes, but that forgive- 
ness was granted because he was circumcised as a 
saving ceremony. He assented to the ceremony 
and all that it implied, and as a return he was for- 
given." Paul would reply : " No, he was accepted 
before that. And the ceremony was accepted and 



The Dictionary of Faith 69 

observed as a seal of the forgiveness he had already 
received." All ceremonies — baptism and the Lord's 
Supper, for example — are expressions of what has 
already taken place, not the means of making it take 
place. They are " outward signs of an inward 
grace." If a man knowingly observes the sign who 
has not the things signified, he commits a forgery, 
tells a lie. 

Then Paul proceeds to explain why this was so 
arranged. It was done so that Abraham might be 
the father of all who believe — of all " who walk in 
the steps of that faith " which he had before he ob- 
served the ceremony. 

We have in this passage, therefore, two truths 
worth transplanting into our gardens of thought. 

First, we get a dictionary of faith. 

Since faith has been given so great a prominence, 
it is important that we know what it is. 

The terms " father " and " son " are very fre- 
quent terms in the Bible. They get their meaning 
from the fact that fathers send down to their sons 
some of their strongest peculiarities, and sons re- 
semble their fathers in the same. We see the physi- 
cal likeness in many ways. I once heard a little 
girl ask her Sunday School teacher the meaning of 
the beatitude, " Blessed are the peacemakers, for 
they shall be called the children of God." Her 
teacher replied, " When you see some little girl 
on the street, you say, I know who that girl is be- 
cause she looks like her mother." So peacemakers 



jo Transplanted Truths from Romans 

are called " children of God " because in their dis- 
positions they are — like God — peacemakers. This 
explains the use of the terms in the Bible. Satan 
was called the father of some lying Jews because 
they resembled the great father of lies. Those that 
have exceptional sympathy and tact in comforting 
people in their sorrows are called " sons of conso- 
lation." James and John because of their enthusi- 
astic energy were called " sons of thunder " (Mark 
3 : 17). Eli's sons were called "sons of wicked- 
ness" (1 Sam. 2 : 12). Others, "children of the 
Evil One." The pious were called " children of 
God." Jesus was the " Son of God " par excellence. 
They that are of faith are " children of Abra- 
ham " children, not by generation, but by simi- 
larity ; there is such a spiritual resemblance between 
the faithful and Abraham as exists between chil- 
dren and parents. 

Because of this we see that Abraham's faith is the 
pattern faith for us. If we desire to know what 
faith is we look to him for the definition. He is our 
dictionary of faith. 

This kind of instruction is very efficient in many 
things. Faith, like other spiritual qualities, is hard 
to define verbally. They are abstract matters ; and 
few people deal in abstract goods. Concrete exam- 
ples of them are easily understood. For example, 
we all get a good conception of forgiveness when 
we read the story of the Prodigal Son. (Luke 15.) 
We know what treachery is when we read of 



The Dictionary of Faith Ji 

Judas. (Matt. 26 : 47.) Courage is made plain 
when we read how Peter and the other apostles 
facing the same Council that had but a week before 
condemned their Master to the cross, said, " We can- 
not but speak the things we have seen and heard " 
(Acts 4 : 20). Love for men finds its definition in 
Paul standing handcuffed and fettered before Fes- 
tus, and, forgetting his own case, saying, " I would 
that not only thou, but all that hear me this day, 
might become such as I am — except these bonds " 
(Acts 26 : 29). So also faith finds its beautiful 
definition in the life of Abraham. We have a re- 
ligious song that is called " The Gospel According 
to You," which points out that in a certain way 
every Christian is a dictionary of Christianity. In 
this sense we may speak of the " Gospel According 
to Abraham." For his version of it Paul certifies 
when he says, " They that are of faith are children 
of Abraham," and tells us to walk " in the steps of 
that faith " which Abraham had. The study of 
Abraham's life becomes therefore, as Paul suggests, 
a helpful agency in the furtherance of our religious 
education. 

Not that the actual deeds of Abraham are to be 
copied, for that would be impossible. But the moral 
principles and religious faith are to be adopted by 
us as our guides and example. From the records of 
his life as given us in the Book we may construct 
a fair notion of the actual Abraham and let that be- 
come an influential standard for us. 



J2 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

Secondly, reading this dictionary we find in its 
definitions the following elements: 

The origin of his faith. There is a mystery about 
the earliest steps of his faith as there is about our 
own. We do not know why our hearts turn from 
an attitude of indifference and perhaps hostility to 
God to one of faith. An old-fashioned evangelist, 1 
when he came to tell his " experience " to the church 
in which he sought membership, said, " In some 
way, and I do not know in what way, I fell in love 
with God and with his people." In some way, and 
we do not know in what way, we also* fall in love 
with God and fall out of love with what is not godly. 
Men do not seek Christian things until in some de- 
gree and for some reason they feel out of sorts 
with themselves. The well do not seek the doctor. 
No man builds a new house unless he is in some 
measure dissatisfied with the old one. No man 
adopts a new way of doing business unless he can 
better himself. If a man has no sense of sin, he 
will have no desire to seek a Saviour from sin. 
But the origin of that spiritual discontent lies below 
the realm of our own self-knowledge. 

Isaiah said : " Look unto the hole of the pit from 
which ye were digged. Look unto Abraham your 
father. I called him alone and blessed him " ( Isa. 
5i : *, 2). 

James wrote, " Of his own will he begat us by 
the word of truth " (James 1 : 18). 

1 Elder Chamberlain, of New Berlin, N. Y. 



The Dictionary of Faith 73 

John wrote, " We are born, not of blood, nor of 
the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of 
God" (John 1 : 13). 

And Paul himself wrote that he became a man of 
Christian faith when it " pleased God to reveal his 
Son" in him. (Gal. 1 : 15, 16.) 

There seems to be a complex agency: moral 
truth taught from childhood, later a knowledge, 
more or less full, of the historical Christ, all ani- 
mated and supplemented by the quickening power 
of what we call the Spirit of God. 

Abraham heard a call to come out from his home 
and kindred. (Gen. 12 : 1.) So we are cut loose 
from our kindred so far as they lead us to neglect 
of our religious duties. We must recognize that in 
matters of the soul every man must give account of 
himself to God. He must be separate — not neces- 
sarily in work or place or family, but in the essen- 
tial experiences of religious life. Separate in duty, 
in hope, in aim, and in destiny. Not to be isolated, 
but to walk with God and with his people. 

He "went out, not knowing whither he went" 
(Heb. 11:8). " Get thee out of thy country, and 
from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto 
a land that I will show thee " (Gen. 12 : 1). It is 
an instructive picture we have in the account: the 
old patriarch, with his family about him, mounting 
the camels and starting away from the place of his 
birth. One sees in imagination the neighbors com- 
ing for a parting interview. They ask him where 



74 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

he is going and why. He replies : " I do not know 
where, but to a land that God will show me. I have 
no map, no plan, but guidance as I go along." This 
is the pattern faith. When any man submits him- 
self to Christ, he does not know what experiences 
he may meet in the line of his Christian duty. He 
cannot tell his own ambitions, for he has none yet. 
He expects guidance. He is going to things that 
God will show him. With Professor Gilmore he 
sings : 

He leadeth me ! O blessed thought ! 

O words with heavenly comfort fraught ! 

Whate'er I do, where'er I be, 

Still 'tis God's hand that leadeth me. 

We all go by a way we have not known before. 
Most ministers say that if they had known the per- 
plexities to be found in the places they accepted, 
they would not have dared to accept. But feeling 
that they were where the Master put them, they 
have leaned upon him and gone forward, in joyful 
obedience, to good successes. 

His faith saturated his daily life. His was not 
simply a desire to get somewhere, but to be some- 
body. The record shows how carefully he culti- 
vated the ethical quality of his life. He kept him- 
self from the canker of covetousness. When Lot, 
his nephew, sought more than was really his due, 
Abraham said : " The land is too small for us both. 
Now you take the part you like best, and I will 



The Dictionary of Faith 75 

take the rest." So he saw Lot take the fertile val- 
ley while he remained in the hills. When the 
herdsmen of Abimelech strove with his own, he 
said, "Let there be no strife between us" (Gen. 
13 : 8). He valued neighborly kindness and peace 
more than pastures for sheep. That disposition de- 
thrones King Mammon in many hearts. 

He was a man of prayer. (Gen. 12 : 8; 13 : 4, 
18.) When he first came to Palestine he built an 
altar and called on the name of Jehovah, and 
named the place " The House of God." Later in 
life he sought it out and made it a place for wor- 
ship, seeking the blessing of God on his family 
and himself. 

He was given to hospitality, as we see in the rec- 
ord of his entertainment of the angel at Mamre. 
(Gen. 18 : 1.) 

He taught his family the rudiments of religion. 
It was written of him, " I know him, that he will 
surely command his children and his household af- 
ter him, and they will keep the way of the Lord, to 
do justice and judgment" (Gen. 18 : 19). 

He was not u too proud to fight" (Gen. 14; 
17 : 9-18, 23-27). When the neighboring tribes 
had attacked Lot and carried him and his household 
off as prisoners, and taken his goods as booty, Abra- 
ham at once armed his servants and pursued the 
rascals, fought them, defeated them, brought back 
his nephew, and all his goods. He was no molly- 
coddle. If he was not always in a state of prepar- 
G 



yb Transplanted Truths from Romans 

edness, it did not take him long to get into it when 
the proper occasion arose. 

But he sought no gain from war. (Gen. 14 : 23, 
24.) The legitimate spoil from the enemy he gave 
to others who had suffered from such incursions 
before, but for himself he said : " No, not even a 
shoe-string for me. I fought not for territory, nor 
for ambition, nor for royal prerogatives, but for the 
sake of the oppressed, to give them liberty and to 
' make it safe ' for them in property and life." 

He was obedient in the highest degree. (Gen. 22 : 
1-12.) It had been promised to him that "in 
Isaac" his seed should be called, and that they 
should be as numerous as the stars of heaven. But 
one day he was told that he should go up and offer 
Isaac as a burnt sacrifice to God. He made no ar- 
gument about it, but in silence took the boy and 
laid him on the altar, ready to the last minute to 
obey the command which not only took his beloved 
son of his loved Sarah, but took the very one in 
whom all the promises were centered, for if Isaac 
died how could he have a numerous progeny? In 
the book of Hebrews it is written that " by faith 
he offered Isaac." Doubtless he did make the full 
surrender in his heart. But the writer of Hebrews 
adds, " accounting that God was able to raise him 
from the dead ; from whence also he received him in 
a figure" (Heb. 11 : 19). 

He was a covenant-keeping man. (Gen. 14 : 22.) 
For him agreements were more than " scraps of 



The Dictionary of Faith JJ 

paper." They bound him sacredly to fulfilment, and 
those who knew him trusted him implicitly. 

It is in these great virtues, both of conduct and 
of faith, that he is given us as our example — our 
dictionary of faith — the steps of whose faith we are 
encouraged to follow that we may be ourselves spir- 
itually children of Abraham and heirs with him of 
the promises. 



CHAPTER VIII 



PAUL S GOD FORBIDS 



As we follow Paul's thought through this letter we 
see that his method was to lay down great principles 
and establish them with proofs taken at times from 
history (Rom. 4 : 1-25), again from observation 
(Rom. 1 : 18-32), and again from his own expe- 
rience. (Rom. 7 : 7-25.) 

Then he considers the questions that his readers 
would be likely to ask and the objections they might 
raise. 

Since human nature has not changed, the same 
questions are now asked and the same objections 
raised. For that reason a careful study of his 
replies will be helpful to us. 

Nine times in this letter he writes the same Greek 
phrase which in our version is translated as " God 
forbid." 1 Each case is connected with an almost 
necessary inference from his statements, but which 
one feels at once is erroneous. Although the logical 
situations as he faithfully develops them seem to 
heap up a weight of compelling warrant, he repudi- 
ates these inferences with his vehement " God 
forbids." 

1 An exact translation would be, " Let it not be so." But the 
phrase carries an element of seriousness about it that makes " God 
forbid " a fair equivalent for it. 

78 



Paul's " God Forbids " 79 

In chapter 3 : 4, after saying that the Jews had 
broken faith with God, he says, in substance : " Shall 
their lack of faithfulness excuse Him from being 
faithful? God forbid." 

In chapter 3 : 6, he says : " If sin furnish a back- 
ground upon which the grace of God shows itself, 
is not God unjust to punish the sinner who thus 
helps him to show off to advantage his great grace? 
God forbid/' 

In chapter 6 : 2, after saying that God's plan 
is intended to glorify the grace of God, he raises 
the question : " If sin makes grace to abound, why 
not make the practice of sin the daily order of our 
lives that grace may have a fine opportunity to 
shine out? God forbid." 

In chapter 7 : 7, after showing that the invariable 
effect of law is to awaken in human hearts antag- 
onism that leads to sin and condemnation, he asks : 
" Is not a law that thus awakens sin a sinful thing 
itself? God forbid." 

In chapter 9 : 14, after having said that before 
the sons of Rebecca had done either good or evil — 
even before they were born — God had said that the 
elder should serve the younger (which was in those 
times a dishonor to the elder) — he asks: " Is God 
then unjust in putting the dishonor upon Esau? 
God forbid." 

In chapter 11 : 1, after showing that Israel as a 
nation had been rejected, he asks : " Has God then 
cast off his people ? God forbid." 



80 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

And in chapter n : n, when he had reminded 
his readers that Israel had fallen, he asks : " Was it 
God's intent that his nation should be at last lost ? 
God forbid." 

Each one of these queries is natural. We should 
raise the same ourselves. We might not so 
promptly reply as he did, " Let it not be so." In 
each one of these there is a germinal error from 
which there has grown a part of great theological 
systems wrought out with patience and logical 
skill. For men have said : " Why should Paul for- 
bid us to follow the logical trend of his statement? 
Are not the rules of logic binding upon us? If we 
accept a statement, are we not bound to accept all 
its logical consequences? And if the logical conse- 
quences are unacceptable, does it not show that the 
statement was erroneous ? If these statements lead 
to unacceptable conclusions, must they not be re- 
vised?" 

George Eliot somewhere wrote that the doctrine 
of justification by faith is an encouragement to sin. 

In every age since Paul's time Antinomianism 
has had a large following. Hyper-Calvinism has 
found disciples in the most intellectual circles. The 
president of the college from which I graduated 
said to me at one time, " I suppose I am at heart a 
hyper-Calvinist." 

Human logic has said, " If God elects some men 
to salvation, then he by inference elects others to 
be lost." 



Paul's " God Forbids" 81 

When apparent evil comes to good men some 
have said, " There can be no overruling Providence 
or these men would not suffer." Others have said 
with Job's unprofitable friends, " The goodness of 
the men was not genuine." 

When riches come to wicked men while poverty 
remains a guest at the table of the good the com- 
plaint of the Psalmist echoes, " In vain have I 
cleansed my heart, and washed my hands in inno- 
cency, for all day long I have been plagued, and 
chastened every morning" (Ps. 73 : 13, 14). 

When the love of God has been presented men 
have become universalists, saying that love cannot 
allow a soul to be lost. 

When evil seems to be dominant men have said 
with an English philosopher, " I would be ashamed 
to make a world like this." 

As I was speaking one night in a schoolhouse 
upon the case of the Amalekites, a man in the au- 
dience rose and said, 

" May I ask a question ? " 

" Certainly," I replied. 

" Did you not tell us the other night that God is 
good?" 

" I certainly did." 

" Well, how do you harmonize that with this com- 
mand to kill all the women and children of the 
Amalekites ? " 

A little boy asked his mother, 

" Mother, is not God good and powerful ? " 



82 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

" Certainly, my son." 

" Why then does he not kill the devil and be done 
with it?" 

A man exhorted by the deacons of his church to 
resume his walk with the church replied, " I know 
I am a wandering sheep, but I expect the Good 
Shepherd to come and bring me back." But he 
did not so much as turn his face toward the fold 
from which he had strayed. 

These are samples of the reasonings that appear 
along the line of Christian history as often as weeds 
appear in a garden. For this reason let us examine 
some of the replies that Paul made to such things. 

In chapter 6 : 2, in rejoinder, when some one 
says, " Let us sin that grace may abound," he says, 
" How can we who are dead to sin continue 
therein ? " That is, How can we conclude for any 
reason that it is our duty to sin? But why may 
we not do so? Because the very fundamental aim 
of the Christian life is to get rid of sin. It was 
for that reason we became disciples of Christ. Any 
idea that interferes with that must be discarded as 
absurd. Logic or no logic, that purpose to get rid 
of sin must be kept dominant. 

In chapter 9 : 11, to the saying that God was un- 
just in his dealings with Esau, the reply is : " God's 
righteousness is fundamental. It is the major 
premise of all reasonings. Nothing can be true 
that discredits his character. If therefore we say 
that he dealt unjustly with Esau we discredit him, 



Paul's "God Forbids" 83 

and that is religiously absurd, and must be er- 
roneous." 

In chapter 7 : 7 the premise is : " God's law is 
just." Any view that disputes it is erroneous. 
Even if the law appears to produce sin it must be 
explained in some other way than by impugning 
God's justness. 

So through all these cases we find that he does 
not answer directly the objections. They are log- 
ically unanswerable by logic alone. He makes his 
appeal to great " Unquestionables " — great " Fun- 
damentals " that are taken as major premises — 
things so firmly embedded in the hearts that they 
cannot be disturbed. 

To transplant this method is our true refuge from 
the imperfect reasonings of distrustful hearts. 
" Let God be true though every man a liar." Let 
God be just though every man a sinner. Let Christ 
be crowned in our hearts though every other 
teacher be discredited. So the blind man in the 
gospel story (John 9), when he could not reply to 
the questions put to him by the Pharisees, affirmed: 
" I do not know whether Jesus is a sinner or not. 
One thing I know, whereas I was blind, now I see." 
When they pressed him further, he fell back on a 
" fundamental." " If this man were not from God 
he could do nothing of this kind. Since he has done 
it he must be from God." 

So we must come back to the idea that such things 
as the gospel of God does in human hearts and in 



84 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

society can only be done by the truth, and hence 
these things of the gospel are true and come from 
God. 

What are some of these " fundamentals " ? 

God is himself the sum and source of all good- 
ness. The very name " God " implies a being " than 
whom no greater or better can be imagined." If 
" God " be not good then our minds would create 
for us a being that is good. If " God " be not all 
powerful then we will create in our thinking a being 
that is so. In any direction of wisdom, power, and 
love that we may think, out at the end of the line 
of our thinking God is found as the ocean is found 
beyond our vision. He surrounds our thought like 
a boundless sea. He is king of kings. He is father 
of the fatherless. He is the standard of all justice. 
He is the fountain of all mercy. He is the fire of 
judgment against all iniquity. " Out of his mouth 
cometh wisdom and understanding." He knows 
the end from the beginning. We cannot better ex- 
press our idea of him than in the words of the 
prophet Isaiah (Isa. 40 : 12-17) : 

" Who hath measured the waters in the hollow 
of his hand, and meted out heaven with a span, 
and comprehended the dust of the earth in a mea- 
sure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the 
hills in a balance? Who hath directed the Spirit 
of Jehovah, or, being his counselor, hath taught 
him? With whom took he counsel, and who in- 
structed him, and taught him in the path of justice, 



Paul's "God Forbids" 85 

and taught him knowledge and showed to him the 
way of understanding? Behold the nations are as 
the drop of a bucket, and are accounted as the small 
dust of the balance. Behold he taketh up the isles 
as a very little thing. And Lebanon is not suffi- 
cient to burn nor the beasts thereof sufficient for a 
burnt-offering. All the nations are as nothing be- 
fore him, they are accounted by him as less than 
nothing, and vanity." 

God is revealed in creation. If there is a " class 
who have contracted toward religion a repugnance 
that makes them overlook the fundamental verity 
contained in it," 2 or if they adopt the idea that " the 
Power which the universe manifests is utterly in- 
scrutable," 3 or if, with Mr. Wells, they hold that 
the Creator is a " veiled being," and rest in the 
name that Professor Huxley gave to himself — 
agnostic — then for all practical purposes they are 
atheists. If the reader of this has come to such a 
place, I am unable to help him untangle his feet 
from the net of these troublesome inferences. 4 

But if Paul were to be asked about this I think 
he would say that if we are agnostic about the 
" veiled Being," it is our fault, for the " invisible 
things of God are clearly seen in the things that are 
made" (Rom. 1 : 20). 

He does not say " are reasonably inferred," but 

2 Spencer, " First Principles," sec. 5. 
8 Spencer, sec. 1 6. 

* An excellent discussion of this will be found in " Reconstruction 
of Religious Beliefs," by W. H. Mullock. 



86 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

they are " seen." That is, some ideas of greatest 
value do not come to the soul through the door of 
reason. They are not brought to us over the mail- 
route of logic, nor even by the aeroplane of ecclesi- 
astical authority ; but they come by the wireless sys- 
tem of intuition. They vibrate through the universe 
from the throne and are available for all who will 
be responsive to them. Does a man know that he 
loves his only son because his reason tells him so ? 
Does he know that a landscape is beautiful, or that 
Niagara is grand or that thunder is reverence- 
inspiring, or that a bright sun thrills him with 
vigor — these and many more great experiences, are 
they the product of reason, and do we wait the 
processes of logic before we know them? To ask 
the question is to answer it. These fundamental 
conceptions are intuitions. Reverence for the Be- 
ing that made us, confidence in the goodness of 
the author of goodness, faith in a being of infinite 
power and unfailing wisdom are the multiplication- 
table of all thinking on morals or religion. Logic 
may confirm and clarify them, but they exist in 
large measure independent of logic. 

"I am with yon always" It is said by many 
that the world is getting worse and worse ; that the 
church is corrupt ; that wickedness is rampant ; that 
the idea that the gospel of God has power to redeem 
the world is contradicted by the facts of history and 
the observation of the open-eyed. These say that 
the church is not only failing to be victorious, but 



Paul's " God Forbids " 87 

that the Saviour taught us it was to be so. His 
word about the pervasive methods of the gospel 
are twisted into a prophecy that the leaven of evil 
would utterly " spoil the meal." 

There is no use in arguing with such errorists. 
No idea can be gotten out of any mind except by 
the door it went in at. And this idea did not go 
in at the door of reason. It went in either through 
an unjustifiable fear, or spiritual laziness, or great 
lack of an intelligent faith. 

But we fall back on the " fundamental " that 
Jesus sent out his disciples with the purpose of 
preaching to the world, and with the promise that 
he would be with them even unto the end. To 
say that with such a commission and such a guide 
the church is to fail is too absurd to need refuting. 

For the church to fail would be for him to fail. 
The true church is his body, so Paul said; and is 
that body to rot out with evil diseases ? No ! Be- 
cause he is the Christ we believe he will win the 
love of the world. Every victorious people will 
bring the crowns of their victory and lay them 
down at his feet and say, " Thou art worthy to re- 
ceive the honor." 

By what processes it may be brought about no 
man knows. We know that he has told us what 
to do, and has said that every knee shall bow to 
him. If he has additional agencies to promote the 
victory, they will be set at work as they are needed. 
If the time be long or short, a day is with him as 



88 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

a thousand years and a thousand years as one day. 
His kingdom does not run on time-tables like a 
railroad. Its Superintendent acts as the farmer 
does. He plants his corn or cuts his wheat when 
the time is ripe for it. Things are done in " due 
season," in the " fulness of times." 

If we sometimes are discouraged by the fact that 
some evil rich seem to be more the favorites of 
God than some saintly poor, we are not to infer 
that God has forgotten. We are not to sing the 
song of doubt. 

Evil has won in the horrid feud 

Of ages with the throne. 
Evil stands on the neck of good 

And rules the world alone. 

There is no good; there is no God; 

And faith is a heartless cheat 
That bares the back for the devil's rod 

And scatters thorns for the feet. 

We fall back on the " fundamental " that God is 
God and God is true. We sing the song of faith : 

Evil is only the slave of good, 

Sorrow the servant of joy. 
And the soul is mad that refuses food 

From the meanest in God's employ. 

The fountain of joy is fed by tears 
And love is lit by the breath of sighs. 

The deepest griefs and the wildest fears 
Have holiest ministries. 5 

5 Holland, " Bitter Sweet." 



Paul's" God Forbids" 89 

If men point to the world war and say, " What 
good is the victory of democracy over kaiserism to 
those who have given their life in securing it ? " 
we say that all the New Testament teaches us that 
the hope of the world is in the resurrection, that is, 
in the continuance of life in another world. And 
that the fruitage of a right life here will be gath- 
ered there. If there be no future life, then the 
Christian is most surely destined to disappoint- 
ment. But, after all, the consciousness of being 
right even at great cost of inconvenience or suffer- 
ing or even death is worth more in the soul's market 
now, as it was in Moses' time, than all the riches of 
Egypt. 

The Bible is reliable in matters of religion. If 
men say that there are errors in the Bible and 
therefore it is not to be trusted, we say that it has a 
current of ideas running through it that have never 
failed to »bring peace to the soul. And on that great 
" fundamental " we fall back. It tells us of a God 
whose ways are ways of pleasantness and whose 
paths are paths of peace for the soul that seeks not 
to satisfy curiosity but guidance in life and hope 
in the future. Any inference contrary to that we 
put into the class of " inadmissibles." 

Christian experience can be trusted. If at some 
time of spiritual drouth one is tempted to say that 
there is no certain proof of the gospel of God suffi- 
cient to warrant our full dependence upon it, we re- 
ply that the most certain and real things of life 



90 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

are the changes that take place in the chambers of 
our own consciousness. We know that when we 
trust and obey Christ the most fully we have the 
best experiences of life. We know that in such 
time we have the greatest strength to resist evil, 
the greatest comfort in our many sorrows, the high- 
est ambitions for life, the greatest courage to meet 
difficulties. We know also that after we did ally 
ourselves with Christ our likes and dislikes ex- 
changed places. The pages of the Bible took on a 
new interest, the companionship with the best peo- 
ple of our own time and the regard for the best 
people of past times became more agreeable. We 
think of these changes with gladness. So we say, 
Whatever questions may be raised, this we know: 
faith in Christ always works good and not evil. 
God forbid that we should close the fountain of 
comfort and peace to ourselves and to others. 

And so we might go through the whole list of 
perplexities and find that the solution is not in 
tracing out every root of mistake, or correcting 
every unwarranted inference, but in drowning the 
perplexity of small things in a sea of faith in the 
" fundamentals." That was Paul's method. 

Herbert Spencer concluded very illogically that 
because we cannot know God fully, or even grasp 
any of his attributes completely, therefore God is 
absolutely unknowable. But if that were true we 
cannot know anything about anything. For what 
subject is there of which we can say that we know 



PauFs" God Forbids" 91 

all about it in any single direction? We do know 
many things about God. We know that he is good, 
and wise, and reliable in all his ways. So when we 
meet with things in our thinking or in our lives 
that are beyond our depth, we fall back on our con- 
ception of him and do as the Psalmist did, " commit 
our ways unto God, trust also in him." 

Life's mysteries are solved by life, 
And doubts that rise in anxious strife 
Before the love of God decline. 

We seek in worldly phrase to paint 
The Unknown God to finite eyes. 
Our logic kills our charity, 
Our wisdom widens mystery, 
Our altars bear no sacrifice. 

Faith born of love and fed by hope 
Sees God where reason's eye is dim, 
And reason led by faith will prove 
So strong that doubts will never move, 
Nor clouds disturb our trust in him. 



H 



CHAPTER IX 

THE GOSPEL OF GOD IN PANTOMIME AND 
PERSONIFICATION 

PANTOMIME 

One of the interesting elements of Paul's letters is 
the raciness of his style. He has an active observa- 
tion, an analytic mind, and a vivid imagination. 
His metaphors come from several sources because 
he was observant. The life of the soldier, the scenes 
of the court-room, the work of the carpenter, the 
activities of the farmer, were easily pressed into 
service to help him convey his thought to his read- 
ers. His use of these agencies is a fruitful study. 
In this chapter I wish to notice his explanation of 
baptism, and his allegoric presentation of the gospel. 

Pantomime is a series of actions staged to express 
ideas without any words. In its simplest form it 
may be no more than a system of sign language 
such as American Indians use among themselves. 
But in its maturer stages it is a more formal and 
complex set of actions. It might be called a " silent 
sermon. " 

This way of communicating ideas was very com- 
mon in the prophetic days. As an instance we may 
read in Jeremiah 19 : " Then said Jehovah, Go and 
92 



Gospel in Pantomime and Personification 93 

buy a potter's bottle, and take of the elders of the 
people, and of the elders of the priests; and go 
forth into the valley of the son of Hinnom which 
is by the gate Harsith, and proclaim there the words 
that I shall tell thee. . . . Then shalt thou break the 
bottle in the sight of the men that go with thee, 
and thou shalt say unto them: Thus saith Jehovah 
of hosts; even so will I break this people and this 
city as one breaketh a potter's vessel that cannot be 
made whole again." 

Another may be found in Ezekiel 4 : 1-3 : " Thou 
also, son of man, take thee a tile, and lay it before 
thee, and portray upon it a city, even Jerusalem: 
and lay siege against it, and build forts against it ; 
and cast up a mound against it; set camps also 
against it, and plant battering rams against it round 
about. And take unto thee an iron pan, and set it 
for a wall of iron between thee and the city, and 
set thy face toward it, and it shall be besieged, and 
thou shalt lay siege against it. This shall be a sign 
unto the house of Israel." 

Israel understood the meaning of such things 
with double certainty. 

In a much more elaborate and dignified way the 
temple service was ordered as an object-lesson. 
The very sacredness of the temple precincts began 
the lesson. Then the priest clothed in white, with 
his breastplate of beauty and elegance, coming in 
silence to offer the blood of the sacrifice, and then 
going in solemn march to the inner sanctum swing- 



94 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

ing the censer of burning incense, while the people 
waited in expectation until he returned from the 
symbolic presence of God in their behalf — that was 
impressive indeed. When the queen of Sheba came 
and saw it, she said : " The half had not been told 
me. Happy are thy men, and happy are these thy 
servants that stand before thee continually." 

One cannot think carefully of the temple or the 
tabernacle, and fail to see how wisely the use of 
ceremonial pantomime was utilized to impress truth 
about God and salvation. 

As language improved and general culture in- 
creased, the need for pantomime lessened. In the 
New Testament we have but little of it. The high 
priest rent his clothes when Jesus was before him 
(Mark 14 : 63), the apostles shook off the dust 
from their feet as they left cities that had mis- 
treated them (Acts 13 : 51), the Jews threw dust 
into the air to express their disgust and anger. 
(Acts 22 : 23.) Jesus made a dignified use of this 
expressive agency when he gave the ordinances of 
baptism and of the Lord's Supper. 

Paul is replying to the supposed question of some 
man that has heard the statement that the Christian 
way of life was originally intended to exalt the 
grace of God : " Well then, Let us sin that grace 
may abound." I have spoken of a part of Paul's 
reply in the chapter on " Paul's God Forbids." 
But he is not satisfied to leave the matter. He 
brings another argument into use. He says: 



Gospel in Pantomime and Personification 95 

" Know ye not that so many of you as were bap- 
tized into Christ, were baptized into his death? We 
were buried therefore with him, through baptism 
into death, that like as Christ was raised from the 
dead by the glory of the Father, so we also should 
walk in newness of life" (Rom. 6 : 3, 4). Taking 
this passage in connection with other teachings of 
Paul and of Jesus, I am obliged to think that Paul's 
idea here is not that baptism was a channel of 
grace. It was not procurative of any change in 
relations of the soul to God by reason of any mi- 
raculous operation. It was an act to be performed 
by the believer and the baptizer for the purpose of 
showing in pantomime the fundamental ideas of the 
"gospel of God." It certainly is an impressive 
ceremony when administered as it was intended, in 
serious view of its meaning. A believer — one who 
has committed himself to Christ because he feels 
the need of a new life, and knows that only in 
Christ he can have it — he therefore having heard 
the apostolic preaching about baptism — comes to the 
administrator and says : " I have joined myself to 
Christ. I want to follow his instruction and be 
baptized. I want to confess my union with him 
and my trust in his atoning death and triumphant 
resurrection by the ceremony he designated/' 

Then the administrator and the believer — as in 
the case of Philip and the eunuch (Acts 8 : 38) — 
go down into the water together, and the adminis- 
trator buries the believer in the water, and then 



g6 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

raises him from the water, and they go out to the 
shore or out of the baptistery. Probably at the first 
all was in silence — no sermon dulled the impression 
it made — though it is customary now for the com- 
pany of believers to sing some suitable hymn like 
the one written by Rev. George W. Bethune, be- 
ginning, 

O thou who in Jordan didst bow thy meek head, 
And whelmed in our sorrow didst sink to the dead, 
Then rose from the darkness to glory above, 
And claimed for thy chosen the kingdom of love, 

Thy footsteps we follow, to bow in the tide, 
And are buried with thee in the death thou hast died, 
Then wake in thy likeness to walk in the way 
That brightens and brightens to shadowless day — 

And then he is sympathetically welcomed into the 
fellowship of the church. 

This pantomime I say makes a great impression, 
and tells a great gospel, even the " gospel of God!' 

It is a great pity that certain views about the 
form of the ordinance * and about the miraculous 
effect of it should have been so much discussed and 
so bitterly maintained, that the simple beauty of the 
act itself as a teaching ordinance has been generally 
overlooked, or, if not, finds it difficult to be looked 
at with entirely unprejudiced eye. 

1 1 received the rite of immersion when I united with the church 
of Christ. But I am not now concerned to discuss either the ques- 
tion of the form of the ordinance, or whether it may legitimately 
be changed. I am only opening this passage to view it in its con- 
nection. 



Gospel in Pantomime and Personification 97 

I am now concerned, however, only with the act 
as a part of Paul's reply to the question, " Shall we 
sin that grace may abound ? " From his point of 
view the message of this ordinance was a complete 
answer to the question asked, and to the suggestion 
that men sin for the sake of showing the grace of 
God to better advantage. 

Let us see what the argument of the pantomime 
really was. What did it say to the thoughtful 
onlooker? 

It said four things: 1. It declared a fact of ex- 
perience. 2. It confessed a faith. 3. It recorded a 
vow. 4. It expressed a purpose. 

The fact declared was that the believer had so 
united himself to Christ that he considered Christ's 
death as in some way his own death. Christ had 
died for him. If the pantomime had stopped in the 
first section it would have said: This man is dead 
with Christ, and his funeral is over. He admits 
that under God's law he is a condemned man, and 
Christ has taken a place with him as a condemned 
sinner, and has gone to the cross because of this 
association. 

I am not saying that all the believers saw this 
clearly or that any of them understood it fully. But 
I am saying that Paul so interpreted the matter. 
And that interpretation is in accord with his teach- 
ings all the way through his letters. 

" I dead with Christ ! Christ dead with me ! n 
that was the message. 



98 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

It confessed a faith in Christ. The fact that a 
believer had come to baptism was at that time — 
much more than now — an open acknowledgment 
that he was a Christian believer. It was not popu- 
lar then. It carried no social prestige but the con- 
trary. It generally brought reproach and contempt 
from the elite of the world. But this man says: 
" I am one of his followers. I belong among his 
people. If they are dead to the old life, so am L 
If they are ready for burial, so am I." 

It made a vow. In the Roman empire when a 
man entered the army he took a vow to be loyal 
and to be brave. That vow was made with the 
sanction of religion. Some god was invoked to wit- 
ness it and to hold him to it. That vow was called 
in the Roman tongue a sacramentum, from which 
our word sacrament comes. From the first the act 
of baptism was considered as a vow — a sacra- 
mentum* in which the believer pledged in solemn 
way his fealty to Jesus and his people. Henceforth 
he was a citizen of the Christian kingdom. There 
was no double allegiance. He was to be a stranger 
and a pilgrim here. He was to look for a " city 
that hath foundations, whose builder and maker is 
God." 

When the children of Israel came out of Egypt 
and crossed the Red Sea, it is said, they were 
" baptized unto Moses in the sea and in the cloud." 
That is, they were visibly cut off from Pharaoh, and 
visibly shut in with Moses. That was taken as a 



Gospel in Pantomime and Personification 99 

sort of pantomime showing that after that there 
was no obligation to Pharaoh but only loyalty to 
Moses. So men are " baptized unto Christ" 

It expressed a purpose. As Christ was raised 
from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we 
also should walk in " newness of life." 

Newness of life. If we think of the life of Jesus 
after his resurrection, we shall see how new it was. 
It was life of spiritual victory. He had conquered 
the last enemy. 

Such, I take it, was the thought of the Christian 
as he came up from the water. He had entered into 
new relations. The old things had passed away. 
Old allegiance, old hopes, old ethical standards, old 
associations, old sins, gone. He was a " new crea- 
ture in Christ Jesus." That view is the only one 
that will interpret Paul's many allusions to the 
Christian life consistently. Newness of life was 
the purpose. 

With this exposition of the pantomime in mind, 
ask yourself if there is in it any answer to the 
suggestion that we " sin that grace may abound." 
If a man's profession in baptism is not a mere farce, 
a counterfeit, a sham, how can he say or think, " I 
will sin that grace may abound " ? 

He is dead to all that old regime of sin. Ideally 
he has no more to do with it than a dead man has 
with his old associates. 

I am not saying that actually such is the case with 
us or with the early Christians ; but ideally it must 



ioo Transplanted Truths from Romans 

be true. If we have any lower ideal we shall fail 
to reach the goal of the Christian life. 

PERSONIFICATION 

Although Paul's pantomime of baptism would 
seem to be a sufficient reply to the suggestion that 
we sin for the sake of giving the grace of God an 
opportunity to magnify itself, he was not satisfied 
to leave the refutation of so subtle a suggestion, 
which would have serious results on life, to that 
alone, but he proceeds to present the truth in 
another way, that is, by personification of the sin. 

To catch the full force of his argument it will 
be helpful to consider the nature of personification. 
It is a figure of speech in which things that have 
no personality are mentally and for the time being 
assumed to have it. Thoughts are ascribed to them, 
words are put into their mouths, as if they were 
intelligent beings. For example, in i Corinthians 
15 : 55 Paul says, as if death could hear him, 
" O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is 
thy sting?" 

One of the most vivid cases of personification in 
our modern times may be found in the preaching of 
America's greatest negro preacher, John Jasper. 2 
"He escorted the Christian to the court of death, and 
demanded of the monster king to exhibit his power 
to hurt. It was wonderful to see how he pictured 

2 See W. E. Hatcher, "John Jasper," p. 176. 



Gospel in Pantomime and Personification 101 

the high courage of the child of God, marching up 
to the very face of the king of terrors and demand- 
ing that he come forth and do his worst." He 
cried out : k '* Grave ! Grave ! " " YYhars yer vict'ry ? 
I hur you got a might}- banner down dar, an' you 
t'rrorizes ev'rybody wat comes long dis way. Bring 
out your armies an' furl fo'th your bann'rs of 
vict'ry. Show your ham an'' let 'em see wat you 
kin do." But in tones subdued. Grave replies : 
" Ain't got no vict'ry now. . . King Jesus pars'd 
through dis country an' tor' my banners down." 

This figure gives great additional force to a state- 
ment. It calls the imagination into use and thus 
makes the truth vivid. It is such a way of expres- 
sion that Paul chose in this passage. He thinks 
things that pertain to a strong tyrannical owner of 
slaves who serves himself with them until he is 
satisfied and then puts them to death. While Paul 
thus speaks about such a tyrant he is really telling 
about " this body of sin " as he calls it, and is thus 
indirectly describing our experience with it. Notice 
how there runs through the chapter the allusions 
to this tyrant. Verse 6, " bondage to Sin M ; verse 
7, " released from Sin '" ; verse 10, " died unto Sin " ; 
verse 12, " let not Sin reign " ; verse 14, " Sin shall 
not have dominion '" ; verse 16, " of Sin unto death " ; 
verse 17. " ye were servants of Sin"; verse 18. 
" made free from Sin " ; verse 20, " ye were ser- 
vants of Sin " ; verse 22, " now being made free 
from Sin": verse 23, ''the wages of Sin is death." 



102 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

His thought is that sin so permeates and controls 
this body that it becomes the very agent of the 
tyrant Sin to bring us to death. Our natural un- 
aided struggle against the tyrant is unsuccessful. 
But Jesus came and took a place with sinful men 
and as a sinner, and with them, as a sinner, he 
was made subject to death. Sin is represented as 
having fought out the contest with Christ, as he 
does with us, and obtained a temporary victory over 
him. As a sinner he was, under the law, con- 
demned, and Death was the executioner of the law. 
" He died unto. Sin." After that, Sin had no more 
to do with him than the sheriff has with the man 
who has been executed. " Death has no more do- 
minion over him." As in the pantomime of bap- 
tism the death and funeral of Jesus was sym- 
bolized, so now Paul says that Jesus has " died 
to Sin " 

But note the surprising thought of Paul. Christ 
does not remain dead. He is raised from the dead. 
What effect then has that on Christ's relation to 
Law and Sin? Suppose that some great general of 
the German army was put to death by the command 
of the Kaiser and buried. But the United States 
had a man who with skill unequaled went there 
and resuscitated the dead man and gave him health 
and strength again. To whom does he now owe 
allegiance? Germany or the United States? Paul 
would say : " In that he died, he died unto the 
Kaiser once for all ; but in that he liveth, he liveth 



Gospel in Pantomime and Personification 103 

unto the United States." So he says that " Christ, 
who has died unto Sin, liveth unto God." 

But when Sin and Death fought out the conflict 
with Christ, it was as when David fought out the 
battle with Goliath. He fought as the representa- 
tive of mankind. His victory was their victory. 
This is Paul's thought in 1 Corinthians 15 when, 
after having told of the coming resurrection of the 
dead, he cries out in triumph, " O Grave, where is 
thy victory?" When Christ was raised, the initial 
victory of God over Death and Sin was gained. 

Now in this place, having the same idea in mind, 
he says, " If we died with Christ, and were with 
him buried (as our baptism portrayed), we believe 
that we shall live again as he did." Such being the 
case, " let not Sin therefore reign in your mortal 
bodies . . . for Sin shall not have dominion over 
you." " Seeing that you were emancipated from 
Sin you became servants of righteousness." It is 
not that you were set free from all restraint. You 
are only freed from a cruel master to become the 
servants of a kind and holy one. Whereas in 
your former condition you had only death for your 
wages, in the service of this new Master, who died 
to obtain you, you have your fruit unto righteous- 
ness, and the end everlasting life, which is " the free 
gift of God." 

Thus, while Paul was only seeking to refute an 
error, we have the gospel indirectly shown in a 
new way. Christ is the one who having become 



104 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

our fellow sinner and example, died. We who are 
united with him by faith share his death and his 
victory over death, and should like him live unto 
God. In Paul's view the death of Christ was not, 
as some say, a mere accident of his mission, nor 
was it, as others say, simply the natural result of 
preaching righteousness to an unrighteous genera- 
tion ; but it was a part of a predetermined plan hav- 
ing for its outcome the loyalty of believers to God. 
As Paul wrote to the Corinthian church, " He died 
for all, in order that they that live should no longer 
live unto themselves, but unto him that died for 
them" (2 Cor. 5 : 15). 

As a conclusion from his reasoning he says, 
" Therefore reckon yourselves as dead unto Sin." 
That is, think of yourselves as now having no fur- 
ther relations to the tyrant Sin. You used to pre- 
sent your members to him for his service. Do so 
no longer, but, on the contrary, present them unto 
God for his service. 

After this somewhat careful study of the com- 
plex passage let us come to consider its practical 
value. 

I notice first the peculiar advantage of thinking 
about the Christian system of teaching in this pan- 
tomimic and personified way. It is imaginative. 
It may not be taken as either philosophic or theo- 
logical in form. To do that is to involve us in un- 
thinkable situations. But if we take it to be — which 
it evidently is — a way of presenting truth so as 



Gospel in Pantomime and Personification 105 

to make it vivid and impressive, it is rich in mean- 
ing and effect. It would be difficult to state the 
subtle and mystical facts about the case more un- 
derstandably than by these methods of expression. 
They take hold of the imagination and the memory 
at once and never let go. All inner experiences are 
dependent for their expression upon things that 
are outer. Jesus could not give his teaching with- 
out the parables and metaphors. And these doc- 
trinal truths demand some concrete framework to 
give them power and stability. 

But what are the truths from this passage that 
are worth transplanting? The first, I should say, is, 
u Reckon yourselves to be dead to Sin!' 

There is a great fund of practical wisdom in 
that exhortation. " As a man thinketh in his heart, 
so is he," says the old proverb. All the great ac- 
tions of moral life are first enacted in the mind. 
Having been rehearsed there, they are compara- 
tively easy of performance in life. A boy of my 
acquaintance was arrested for stabbing his play- 
mate. I went to talk with him in the prison. I 
found that he was accustomed to read with avidity 
all the murder news of the daily papers. He had 
come to " reckon himself " as a brave man ready to 
kill his enemies. 

In traveling, many of us have learned to set aside 
a liberal amount of money for the journey, and 
then we have no unpleasant streaks of economy as 
we are called upon to pay the various charges on 



106 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

the way. We consecrated the whole amount before 
we started. We " reckoned " it already spent. Mr. 
Froude, in his history of England, tells how Sir 
Thomas More, when he was summoned to come 
from his home in Chelsea to London to take an 
oath of acknowledgment of the supremacy of the 
king of England over the church of England, parted 
with his family and went to his boat that was to 
take him to London. Before giving the boatman 
the signal to start he sat down in the boat with his 
arms folded for a while. He was deciding whether 
to yield or not. He knew that if he did not yield 
to the king, he would never return to his home. 
After a few minutes he started up and said, " / 
thank our Lord, the field is won" He then and 
there " reckoned himself dead " under the law of 
England. There was no more struggle about the 
case. He refused to take the oath of submission. 
He was imprisoned for two years in the Tower, 
then taken to the block and beheaded. The his- 
torian says of him : " His execution was the world's 
wonder . . . for the preternatural composure with 
which it was borne . . . Never was a Christian's 
victory more grandly evidenced than in that last 
scene lighted with its lambent humor." 3 

What we think of ourselves is always an impor- 
tant factor in what we make of ourselves. If a man 
thinks he is a nobody, he is more than half sure to be 
such an one. If he has a great respect for himself, 

3 Froude's " England/' vol. II, p. 376. 



Gospel in Pantomime and Personification 107 

quite likely he will become one whom others will 
respect. The soldier who thinks of himself, not as 
a mere individual, but as a representative of Ameri- 
can honor and courage, is already greatly fortified 
against the allurements of army life. 

Paul drafts this psychological fact into service: 
" Reckon yourselves " as having died to Sin. Think 
of yourselves as having forfeited all hopes based 
upon your individual merit. Label yourself as one 
who, without Christ, is condemned. But do not 
stop there. " Reckon yourself " also as alive unto 
God. Decide each question of duty as one who 
owes no allegiance except to God. This attitude of 
mind will be your great defense against almost 
every species of temptation. 

Of all the subtle temptations that come to the 
churches or the individuals, that is the worst which 
says : " You cannot succeed because you are a sin- 
ner from of old. You must wait on the second 
coming of Jesus to deliver you from Sin. Bear it 
with patience as inevitable." Such is not the tone 
of this letter. " Sin shall not have dominion over 
you. He may bother you, he may tempt you; but 
you are not his servant, and he is not your master. 
Live and continue to live in newness of life and in 
enjoyment of daily victories over Sin." Such is the 
counsel of Paul in this chapter. 

And the truth to preserve is, " Know ye not that 
his servants ye are whom ye obey ? " 

Probably every one knows what it is to half 



10S Transplanted Truths from Romans 

think, " Well, I can do this evil thing, or cherish 
this wrong feeling, or say this unkind word, and 
it will be forgiven me because Christ is a forgiving, 
gracious Lord." The fact is that we all need to 
be brought up sharp with a round turn when we 
have such suggestions. " Know ye not," says Paul, 
" that his servants ye are whom ye obey, whether 
of Sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteous- 
ness ? " Every time we submit to an evil prompting 
of the " old man of sin " we are for that time, and 
to that degree, servants of Sin. And Jesus said we 
cannot serve two masters. We may stumble; we 
do make mistakes ; we often lack strength to do ; 
but to allow ourselves to do wrong is to reenlist 
under the old master, and to nullify our sacrament 
of baptism, and to break away from the one whom 
we have undertaken to serve. 

Again we are asked to compare the results of 
the former way of life with the Christian way. 
" When ye were servants of sin, zvhat fruit had 
ye? . . The end of those things is death!' Mem- 
ory tells us that all which we obtain by sinful deeds 
or words or thoughts, passes away and leaves us no 
permanent good. We watch the outgoing of those 
who have lived unto themselves in fleshly pleasures, 
and see that they have to anticipate only death, 
without hope. Surely the " wages of sin is death/' 

But, on the other hand, the gift of God to those 
that, because of having through Christ Jesus died 
to Sin, have been raised with Christ, is eternal life. 



CHAPTER X 

THE BRIDGE FROM A GOOD THEOLOGY TO A BETTER ONE 

" Having died to that wherein ye were held." — Rom. 
7: 6. 

Those who have become acquainted with Jewish 
people know how tenaciously they cling to the re- 
ligious ideas in which they are brought up. It is 
a rare thing to find a Jew who has become a Chris- 
tian believer. In Brooklyn, N. Y., there is a section 
in which sixty thousand Jews live. A Christian 
missionary has worked among them many years. 
He has distributed the New Testament, translated 
into their language, among them in large numbers. 
They hear him preach. Some of them admit they 
like the gospel teaching ; but few break away from 
their Jewish church. Paul found that same sort of 
faithfulness to their national religion among the 
Jews in Rome. 

And no wonder; for while the ethical life he 
taught them was outwardly not much different from 
theirs, inwardly it was almost the opposite. The 
fundamental ideas were in part even contradictory. 
They " worked " for salvation ; he taught it was a 
gift. They thought ceremonial sacrifices were nec- 
essary; he taught that these were all done away. 

109 



no Transplanted Truths from Romans 

They believed that the race of Israel had special 
privileges ; he taught that the wall of partition was 
broken down, and that all who had faith were chil- 
dren of Abraham. They thought Jerusalem was 
the place where the truest worship was to be made ; 
he taught that it made no difference. One can 
scarcely imagine a more radical change than for a 
consistent Jew to become a hearty, thoroughgoing 
Christian. 

And the reason was not a reproach to the Jew. 
He clung to the " law " because he thought it was 
a God-given law binding upon him. 

This section of the letter takes up that phase of 
their difficulty. Paul does not condemn them as 
wrong in intention, but he seeks to give them rea- 
son for changing — to bridge over their difficulties — 
to bridge the way for them to accept his teaching, 
and not condemn what both he and they understood 
to have been a God-given law. 

His " bridge " is this : " Under God's appointment 
you are released from the old regime in order to 
share in the new one. There is no imputation of 
evil intent on your part in the old relations and the 
old theological views ; but they were temporary and 
incomplete. Better things are now being offered to 
you." 

Then, as an illustration of the principle to which 
he appeals, he says : " In your laws it is provided 
that while a husband lives the wife is bound to him; 
but if he dies she is at liberty to marry again. The 



The Bridge from a Good Theology to a Better in 

legal dissolution of the old bond carries with it the 
right to enter a new one/' x 

The wife in this figure represents the Christian 
convert from the Jewish faith. The law of mar- 
riage represents the obligation of the Jew to be 
faithful to his church and God. But now T the ob- 
ligation to the " law " is dissolved because under 
the figure that he has just been using the law has 
ceased to have any force, for the Jewish convert 
has " in Christ " been put to death, and the law 
therefore has no further relation to him. 

While the old covenant was valid, Jews were 
bound by it; now they are at liberty to accept the 
Christian faith, not as an antagonistic one, but as a 
legitimate successor appointed by the Lord. 

If they accept Christ, they are not to think of 
themselves as spiritual adulterers, but as belonging 
to the faithful and honorable " Bride of Christ/' 
united to him under the blessing of God in bonds 
never to be broken. 

Although this piece of argument in its actual 
form has no application to us Gentiles, it involves a 
principle that has to-day a great value and wide 
application. There are many people now who have 

1 The illustration Paul uses here is not carried out fully. He ap- 
pears to confuse himself; for while in the first part he speaks of the 
husband's death, in the latter part he speaks of the woman being 
dead to the law. One is likely to ask why he did not say: "The 
man is bound to the wife as long as she lives," and then continue: 
" Since the law is now done away with, he is at liberty to marry 
again." I take it that he could not use the figure in that way be- 
cause at that time it was not true that a man was bound to the 
woman as long as she lived. Under the law of that time he was at 
liberty to divorce or to have two wives. Hence he could only use 
the figure in connection with the woman. 



H2 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

been brought up in, or have for themselves come 
to have very great faith in, some particular church 
or some particular theory of religion. For a time 
it was satisfactory to them. But now they have 
seen a new light. The old view fails to meet their 
needs. And yet they have been committed to it 
long and sincerely. It looks to them like turning 
traitor to friends and God to accept some other 
view. But there is an inner sense of desire to be 
fully committed to a larger (as they think) and 
better conception of life and its relations. 2 

To such Paul's argument has a value. It is a 
" bridge " for them to pass over to new views with- 
out doing violence to their sense of honor or of 
duty. If God has unmistakably shown a new way 
to be his way, it implies that the obligation to the 
old is dissolved. I suppose that every one would 
feel justified if he knew that it was God's will for 
him to pass from any view into a newer one. But 
the difficulty lies in obtaining the will of God on the 
subject. 

I think we may find light on this matter if we 
consider for a little the possible channels through 
which we may expect to receive the divine instruc- 
tion. 

Suppose, for example, that we know by study that 
a certain mathematical process will give us accurate 
and correct results on a problem in engineering. 

2 Recent books like " The Inside of the Cup," " The Soul of a 
Bishop," " The Invisible King," reveal a great questioning about 
important matters. 



The Bridge from a Good Theology to a Better 113 

It has been tried by others, and we have tried it our- 
selves and found it correct. Would it be any more 
satisfactory if we had seen it written on the sky 
some evening? 

Or suppose that it has been demonstrated be- 
yond question that a certain medicine is a specific 
for chills and fever; thousands have tried it with 
curative results. Would it be any more satisfac- 
tory or effective if we had found the prescription in 
the Bible? 

Certain regulations about food and water and air 
are unmistakably demonstrated to be sane and safe. 
Would they be any more authoritative if they were 
carved in stone by the finger of God and set up at 
every crossroad? 

If a man accustomed to any kind of medical 
treatment found that a different one was equally 
or more effective, would he feel bound to the old? 
A physician who objects to improved methods and 
new medicines is at once discounted as being nar- 
row and second class. 

We all agree that in any of these and many 
thousands of other similar cases nothing would be 
a surer test than being true to the facts. 

But is not the same reasoning forceful in the 
realm of ideas as well as in the realm of the physi- 
cal? Suppose for example that a man has held to 
the sanctity of the Bible because he thought it was 
all written by men whose hands were directed by 
angelic hands, so that in every sentence we have 



H4 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

not only the " word " of God but the " words " of 
God. He has held that view and has sought to 
conform his conduct and his hopes to what those 
angel hands had written for his instruction. But 
more careful study of the facts makes it certain to 
him that different men wrote, not as they were di- 
rected by angels, but as they were " moved by the 
Spirit of God." How is he to know which view to 
take? Does he not say that he must follow the 
truth as he has been able to see it? And if he is 
satisfied that his later view is true is he not as com- 
fortable under it as if he had heard a voice from 
heaven telling him of it ? And is he not as faithful 
to God as he was before he made the discovery that 
angels did not hold the writers' hands ? 

A great part of our conduct is regulated by cer- 
tain ideas we have about the teaching of the Bible. 
Suppose that after years of belief in the duty of 
parents to baptize their children, it becomes evi- 
dent to us that such a ceremony is not called for, 
are we as much bound now to omit it as we were 
formerly bound to have it observed? 

Suppose that a man has been accustomed to fol- 
low Mr. Beecher's teaching and thinks he was a 
more safe leader than Bishop Joyce or Cardinal 
Farley, is he not as much at liberty to follow him 
as the converts of Paul were to follow him instead 
of Gamaliel ; and if a man has followed Calvin, may 
he not become a disciple of some other teacher? 

I think Paul's principle would say to him, " If 



The Bridge from a Good Theology to a Better 115 

God has shown you a new way as plainly as he 
showed you the earlier one, you are not only at 
liberty to follow it, but you ought to follow it." 

All this rests, however, on the idea that the 
TRUTH is God's voice. In that way he makes his 
will known. If in any department of life or of 
thinking we can know the TRUTH, we know the 
will of God. Jesus said, " I am the way, and the 
truth, and the life." We who would know God's 
will must seek the TRUTH, and when we find it, 
we are not " spiritual adulterers " if we embrace it 
and follow it boldly. 

But to say this is not to say that we are to drop 
every idea we do not fully understand and take up 
with everything that looks like truth. It becomes 
us to be very careful not to follow " every wind of 
doctrine " that blows across the plain ; nor follow 
every will-o'-the-wisp that comes along with a glib 
tongue and a sweet voice. It becomes us to weigh 
carefully and judge fairly. But when we have done 
that and are convinced that we have a truth, then 
we are at liberty to accept it, confess it, and live by 
it, no matter what others may say about our dis- 
loyalty. " We are dead to that wherein we were 
held." 

I would notice, -however, that this is not dishon- 
oring what was the truth to us in earlier days. It 
is true in every department of life that men make 
progress. We all do as Paul did. When he was a 
child, he spoke as a child, he thought as a child. 



n6 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

When he was a Jewish student under Gamaliel, he 
thought as a Jewish student. But when he saw 
Jesus in a new light, he followed the new light as 
faithfully as he had followed the earlier dawn of 
truth. We are taught to grow in grace and in the 
knowledge of God. But we cannot grow unless we 
acquire new ideas. That is, they are new to us. 
We are only gaining a fuller view of Truth than 
we had before. It is impossible for us to make any 
advance if we feel bound so closely to the earlier 
ideas that we feel guilty to leave them behind and 
take up larger ones. If the Jews had been thus 
bound, they could never have admitted the Gentile 
converts into their fellowship. Peter at one time 
felt bound thus ; but Paul " withstood him to the 
face because he was to be blamed " (Gal. 2 : 11-13). 
If Paul had felt thus bound we should have had no 
apostle Paul. He would have said to the vision he 
had on the way to Damascus : " I cannot be dis- 
loyal to my old views. The old ceremonial law was 
God-given, I must not discard it." 

If Luther had not found this " bridge," he would 
have remained in the Roman Catholic Church, and 
the Reformation would not have been effected in 
his vicinity. If William Tyndale had not found it, 
we should have had our Bible in no language but 
poor Latin, and that in the hands of poorer priests. 
If Knox and Cromwell had not found it, we should 
to-day be under state church autocracy which damns 
Germany and the world. All the people of the 



The Bridge from a Good Theology to a Better 117 

Congregational, Baptist, Methodist, and Presby- 
terian churches owe their positions in the religious 
world to the exercise by their early leaders of the 
right to cross this " bridge " from old views of 
long standing and great excellence in many respects 
to new ones of better excellence. 

Our only serious question must be, " Does God 
sound the advance ? " And when we listen for the 
reply we hear only this : " God is TRUTH and 
TRUTH is God's voice. Therefore seek the 
TRUTH with courage." That is the "bridge" 
from our earlier position to maturer and wiser 
ones. When TRUTH beckons, take her hand and 
cross the " bridge." 

I am sure some one may say : " This is a subtle 
way of inoculating readers with new theology or 
what has been called with great disgust German 
theology. It is a species of spiritual adultery itself." 

But I must protest that I have no new theology 
and no old theology to present at this time. What 
I would like to do is to have men see that there is 
no life and no growth in grace unless we are at 
liberty to be married to a new truth when we see it 
to be such. 

It will not be considered a strange statement if 
we say that the Christian world to-day is far better 
informed about the meaning and the value of Jesus' 
teaching than the first disciples were. We read 
how in the very first years of the gospel the Jewish 
converts were only half brought over to the Chris- 



n8 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

tian position. James said to Paul when he came 
to Jerusalem, " You see, brother, how many thou- 
sands of the Jews have believed, and they are all 
very zealous for the law" (Acts 21 : 20). Yet it 
is the same law that here in Romans Paul says the 
Christians are freed from. (So also in Gal. 5:1.) 
All those people to whom the letter to Hebrews 
was sent, or for whom it was written, were held 
in a strong bond to the temple at Jerusalem. Un- 
less they had felt at liberty to leave that behind 
they would have remained in a narrow view of 
things. 

If we go back to the Old Testament times we find 
the prophets, who were the real deliverers of Israel, 
were counted as heretical and unsafe. Amos was 
against the dead formalism of Israel. Malachi was 
against the priests. (Mai. 2.) And this not because 
either priest or people was intentionally wrong but 
because a narrow and blind devotion to things-as- 
they-used-to-be prevented them from seeing things- 
that-might-be with advantage. 

Jesus was the arch-enemy of religion if the Phari- 
sees were to be taken as judges. Yet he was only 
leading men's minds out to larger things. 

So it seems to me we are to claim liberty to think, 
and liberty to learn. I do not say liberty to make 
oneself foolish; nor liberty to exchange well-tried 
truths for crude speculations; but liberty to learn 
TRUTH; then courage to confess TRUTH and 
follow it. When some man broaches a view that is 



The Bridge from a Good Theology to a Better 1 19 

new we may not wisely call him disloyal to the 
King, but we may ask him for his reasons. If 
they are good we may join him in the blessing 
of it. 

But some one may say : " We have the Bible as 
the standard of Truth. We cannot invent new 
ideas or discard any that the Bible contains. No 
one is at liberty to depart from that." Suppose we 
admit the full force of that statement ; then we are 
brought to the place where we must inquire what 
the teaching of the Bible is. Here is a man, for ex- 
ample, who has sincerely believed that the world 
will get better and better until all the nations have 
as a whole come to honor Jesus and to walk in his 
ways. But after a time of study, and after reading 
some of the books of men, he is sincerely convinced 
that he has seen only a part of the truth; he has 
been like the man to whom Jesus gave sight — at 
first he saw " men as trees walking," now he thinks 
he sees clearly. And he is certain that evil is to 
corrupt the church and the world until Christ comes 
and reigns on earth for a thousand years, and then 
the earth that now is will be destroyed by fire, and 
a new earth on a better plan will be established. 
Suppose, let us say, that he is sincerely convinced 
that such is the truth; then he must have liberty 
to think so, and to conform his action to his thought. 
He must also take the risk of having his building 
perish like " hay, wood, and stubble," or being like 
gold tried in the fire. (1 Cor. 3 : 10-15.) 



120 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

But the crucial thing is that in determining what 
the Bible teaches he seeks the TRUTH. And in 
seeking it he must use his own judgment. That 
judgment is human at best. He may therefore fall 
into conclusions about the teachings of the Bible 
that are not correct conclusions. Being only human 
judgments they are not assuredly infallible. A cu- 
rious instance of this is found in the reasoning 
about the depravity of man. It was said that, be- 
ing depraved in all his being, his reason is not safe 
to follow. Therefore men valiantly defended the 
doctrine of depravity and condemned the conclu- 
sions of human reason as unsound of a necessity. 
But they overlooked the fact that their own reason, 
in so concluding, was unreliable, and being itself 
depraved its conclusions about depravity might be 
wrong. 

So we conclude that in many things, in which 
experience is not able to decide which is correct, 
we can only give liberty, and take liberty to think 
and act; being careful not to underestimate the 
testimony borne by the church through ages of 
trial in the furnace of life to the great fundamental 
facts and principles of the common Christian faith, 
namely: Christ Jesus the authoritative representa- 
tive of God; who came to earth; took our form; 
and as such died; was buried; raised from the 
dead; now sitteth on high; to whom it is the part 
of wisdom and duty to commit ourselves as our 
Teacher, Guide, and Saviour, in full confidence that 



The Bridge from a Good Theology to a Better 121 

those who thus commit themselves will be given a 
resurrection like unto his and will be with him in 
a future world that is to be revealed in due season. 
Being, for good reasons, released from allegiance 
to any other views we are free (using the figure of 
Paul) to be " joined to another and bring forth 
fruit unto God." 



CHAPTER XI 



A VICTORIOUS DEFEAT 



"I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord." — 
Rom. 7 : 25. 

This seventh chapter is a notable one; a field of 
many great discussions and small agreements. In 
the section included between the fourteenth and the 
twenty-fifth verses the discussions have been es- 
pecially earnest. Paul is describing a serious re- 
ligious experience of some one; and the inquiring 
have been asking, Who is the some one? Is it 
Paul's own spiritual biography used to illustrate 
and explain his teaching? Or is it a supposed case 
introduced to throw light on his teaching? And if 
it be either one or the other, does it relate the ex- 
periences of a man " regenerate " or " unregen- 
erate " ? If we say " regenerate/' are we satisfied 
to say that such an one is "miserable" and 
" wretched " as in verse 24? If we say " unregen- 
erate," how shall we account for his saying, as in 
verse 25, that he serves the law of God with his 
mind, but that with the flesh he is servant to the law 
of sin? 

While these are interesting questions for the stu- 
dent of religious psychology, I shall pass by them 
122 



A Victorious Defeat 123 

that we may consider rather the helpful message of 
the section. 

First, let us get a perspective of the passage. He 
says, " I am carnal, sold under sin," like a slave 
bought at the auction block, by a master unrelent- 
ing and strong. I battle for liberty, but I am al- 
ways defeated. I despair of getting my liberty. 
The chains of this living death seem to be riveted 
on. Wretched man that I am! Who can deliver 
me from the bondage? Then, as if he saw some 
strong deliverer come to his rescue, he bursts out 
with the text, " I thank God through Christ Jesus 
our Lord." 

The apostle introduces this illustration because 
he rightly assumes that it is the experience of all 
serious-minded people to have a similar battle, and 
he would lead them to have a similar victory. 

But it is of importance to note the origin of the 
battle. He says, I was " alive once without the law." 
That is, there was a time when he was not having 
a battle. He felt secure. No evil threatened him. 
But when the " law came " he died. I take it that 
he means when he came to see what the law of God 
really demanded, then he saw how much he lacked, 
and then his battle began. For he knew the out- 
ward requirements of the law from his youth, but 
its inner demands he had not seen. 

There are some of those who read this that do 
not see that his words are suitable to their condi- 
tion. And there is no suitableness — now. There 

K 



124 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

was a time when much that is here said was not 
suitable for Paul himself. Until he was awakened 
to the high demands of God, he was not conscious 
of any great deficiency in himself. A young man 
once said to me as I spoke to him about his relig- 
ious needs, " Really I do not need the gospel." 
It is not until one has begun a serious attempt to 
be thoroughly good in deed and thought that these 
sayings have much pertinency. When the condi- 
tions arrive they will be suitable. 

There are four stages in this biography: 
First, the battle. When a man begins seeking 
to be " right with God " his battle starts. We all 
know what it is to be more or less conscious at 
times of being a sort of citadel which is being be- 
sieged by two distinct and opposing parties. We 
seem to stand between the two, and are called upon 
to decide which shall have possession of us. This 
is not a conception born in Jewish training, nor is it 
a dogma of theology; it is simply a psychological 
fact. 

In recent years many books have been published 
dealing with the psychology of religion. 1 The 
central fact in them all is the recognition of 
what one has called " the divided self." No mat- 
ter how well we have been brought up, nor how 
solidly established our habits have become, every 

1 Such as James, " Psychology of Religious Experience/' and 
"The Will to Believe"; Cutten, "Psychological Phenomena of 
Christianity"; Pratt, "Psychology of Religious Belief"; Davenport, 
"Primitive Traits in Religious Revivals"; Coe, "Religion of a 
Mature Man." 



A Victorious Defeat 125 

little while we find the other kind of habits trying 
to break into our lives. Even when we think we 
have permanently mastered one set of tendencies 
so that we can keep our acts and words in line with 
our ideal, we come to see that there remain in the 
heart, like the old habits of thought which immi- 
grants retain after they have learned the ways of 
a new country and have become loyal citizens un- 
der its government, motives and susceptibilities that 
we are ashamed of. They lie dormant much of the 
time, but on occasion they spring up like ambushed 
Indians to take us prisoners. Then the injunction, 
" Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest 
he fall," finds an application to us. 

The New England Primer — the book on which 
for one hundred and fifty years the children of 
New England were religiously nourished — had in it 
a dialogue supposedly between a youth and Jesus 
and Satan. Satan says among other things : 

If thou wilt but be ruled by me, 

An artist thou shalt quickly be; 

In all my ways which lovely are 

They're few with thee who shall compare. 

Then Christ is represented as making his plea for 
the youth's life : 

Wilt thou, O youth, make such a choice, 
And thus obey the Devil's voice? 
Curst sinful ways wilt thou embrace, 
And hate the ways of truth and grace? 



126 Transplanted Truths from Romans 
The youth replies : 

Thy ways, O Christ, are not for me ; 
They with my age do not agree. 

Then, after another plea by Christ, the youth re- 
plies : 

Amazed, Lord, I now begin. 

Oh help me, and I'll leave my sin. 

This quaint, and in some ways disagreeable, form 
of presenting it does after all put the truth in story 
fashion that every one of us has the choice to make 
between two strange and dissonant elements that 
press us to accept their supremacy in our lives. At 
times these " voices " seem to be distinctly from 
some one outside the inner chamber of our souls. 
At other times they seem to be hardly distinguish- 
able from ourselves. Sometimes we are surprised 
and ashamed to find springing up from within 
thoughts and ambitions and semimotives that would 
make us despise others if we knew they had such. 2 

We battle with tendencies to do unethical acts; 
but these tendencies are by no means the most 
troublesome. We find an unreadiness to accept 
fully the teachings of Jesus. We ask " why " to 
everything he counseled us to do. Objections arise 
to almost every requirement of duty to God or man. 
Agnosticism puts in its protest against almost all 

2 Bunyan. 



A Victorious Defeat 127 

the positive ideas of religion. A thinking man is 
obliged to reason away unreasonable things. We 
fight dispositions that are unduly sensitive, and are 
always watching for slights. Personal pride makes 
us unhappy when we are criticized. A spirit of in- 
dependence holds us back from admitting that we 
are dependent on Christ. We face a dislike to the 
whole doctrine of grace. Fear of poverty disputes 
with charity. Greed of gain struggles against mis- 
sionary duty. The deceitfulness of riches and the 
cares of the world choke the good seed of the word 
until it brings no fruit to perfection. It is not 
against flesh and blood that our battle is fought 
but against spiritual wickednesses. 

The voice of Christian fellowship calls to us, 
and it is drowned by the claims of denominational 
feeling. We desire the approval of others, but 
loyalty to truth calls on us to scorn their approval. 
Love of pleasure would lead us to underestimate 
the value of usefulness and sacrifice. A whole 
phalanx of things attack us from both sides, each 
seeking to gain control of the " I myself.'' If one 
had eyes to visualize the heart of man, he would 
see it as a kind of battle-field in which the tide of 
victory swings now one way and now the other, 
each important point being fought for over and 
over again. 

The universality of such a conflict is witnessed by 
the hymns we sing and the prayers we unitedly 
utter. 



128 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

Rev. George Heath crystallized and immortal- 
ized our common warning in the hymn: 

My soul, be on thy guard ; 

Ten thousand foes arise; 
The hosts of sin are pressing hard 

To draw thee from the skies. 

O watch and fight and pray; 

The battle ne'er give o'er; 
Renew it boldly every day, 

And help divine implore. 

In the General Confession of the Church we 
read : 

Almighty and most merciful Father; We have erred, 
and strayed from thy ways like lost sheep. We have fol- 
lowed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts. 

And in the Litany we join again and again in 
the prayer : 

From all blindness of heart; from pride, vainglory, and 
hypocrisy; from envy, hatred, and malice, and all un- 
charitableness, 

Good Lord, deliver us. 

From all inordinate and sinful affections; and from all 
the deceits of the world, the flesh, and the devil, 
Good Lord, deliver us. 

From all false doctrine, heresy, and schism ; from hard- 
ness of heart, and contempt of thy Word and Command- 
ment, 

Good Lord, deliver us. 



A Victorious Defeat 129 

All these bear witness to the time-long struggle 
of evil and good so much within us that we some- 
times think we are only the prize for which they 
contend rather than a party interested in the con- 
tention. 

Secondly, the defeat. " I find a law in my mem- 
bers, warring against the law of my mind, and 
bringing me into captivity under the law of sin 
which is in my members. . . The good which I 
would, I do not; and the evil which I would not, 
that I practise." If we were not thoughtful we 
should say that Paul accused himself either unjustly 
or insincerely. But when we delay our speech while 
we take a look into the depths of our own hearts, 
we are made to see that his story is our story. Who 
is the man that can say he carries out all his reso- 
lutions for good? The failure is so universal that 
" New Year's resolution " has come to be a syno- 
nym for short-lived success, that lasts over a sun- 
rise or two, and then goes to the waste of life. 
Some day when health is good, and the sun is 
bright, and the surroundings favorable, we seem 
to have made a good success. But as soon as the 
sun goes down and the darkness comes on, a careful 
inspection of the day's life shows marks and scars 
and blemishes that despoil us of our comfort. " In 
the practical life of the individual, we know how his 
whole gloom or glee about any fact depends on the 
remoter schemes and hopes with which it stands 
related. Let it be known to lead nowhere, and 



130 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

however it may be in its immediacy, its glow and 
gilding vanish." 3 Luther said to a friend who had 
wished him long life, " Rather than live forty years 
I would give up my chance of Paradise." Louis 
Stevenson, the most confirmed and persistent opti- 
mist of his day, whose writings at times contain the 
very elixir of hope, said : " Whatever else we are 
intended to do, we are not intended to succeed. 
Failure is the fate allotted; our business is not to 
continue to fail in good spirits.'' 

The Preacher of Ecclesiastes said repeatedly, 
" All is vanity and vexation of spirit." 

The man regarded by the world as the happiest 
man has the inmost consciousness that he has not 
attained his aim in holy living, that the goal still 
beckons him from far ahead. 

We need not to make any argument to others or 
to ourselves to bring us into an understanding of 
this phase of the battle. We know that by the 
works of law of any kind neither ourselves nor 
others are justified. We all come short. The good 
in us is defeated. 

Thirdly, the despair. Paul says, " O wretched 
man that I am, who shall deliver me ? " And his 
thought is that on the basis of his own doings or 
merit he cannot find a deliverer. 

We must not forget here that he is trying to 
teach, and in doing so he is supposing a case. That 
is, he is neither telling his own actual condition at 

3 James, "Varieties of Religious Experience,'* p, 148. 



A Victorious Defeat 131 

that time, nor exactly his condition at any other 
time. He is practically saying, " If I were to think 
that my justification, that is my standing before 
God, is dependent on my own merit — my own actual 
keeping of any law — I should be obliged to say, 
O wretched man." And his idea is that any man 
then or now that rests his hope on his own actual 
goodness rests it on a foundation of sand. And 
there is for him no other foundation. Of course 
Paul knew that at the time he wrote, but he states 
the case of a man who might try to stand on that 
legal basis or who might — as it was called in 
another letter — " fall from grace " and land on the 
lower platform of law. 

Probably few now feel the poignancy of that 
despair as he did or as some have since then. The 
days of camp-meeting experiences are not now upon 
us. But the most self-examining ones among us in 
the calmest moments of self-scrutiny can have no 
hope for any peace if they look for it in them- 
selves alone. " This sadness lies at the heart not 
merely of every positivistic, agnostic, or naturalistic 
scheme of philosophy. Naturalism fed on cosmo- 
logical speculations puts men in the position of 
people living on a frozen lake, surrounded by im- 
passable cliffs, and yet knowing that little by little 
the ice is melting and the inevitable day drawing 
near when the last film will disappear and they all 
be drowned." 4 

* Professor James. 



132 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

Fourthly, the victory. " I thank God, through 
Jesus Christ our Lord." Paul now turns to the 
relief that the gospel gives to men such as he has 
been describing. And this is the jewel of the text. 
Out of all the despair, whether great or little, the 
message of Christ brings us rejoicing. To all that 
labor and are heavy-laden Christ offers rest of soul 
if they will commit themselves to him. 

This is the victory of defeat. If the hopeless 
struggle to be flawless in oneself does actually lead 
men to a faith in Christ such that not only are their 
relations to God set right, but a new power is intro- 
duced into life that gives them a gradual but surely 
gaining saintliness ; and if that faith could not have 
been gained in any other way than the despair by 
which it was brought, it is a victory indeed. 

The theory of Paul — and the facts of life con- 
firm it — is that until men are rendered hopeless in 
themselves they will not value the gospel of Christ ; 
and therefore the law came in that sin might 
abound. But where sin abounded grace did super- 
abound. The whole scheme of salvation was by 
him conceived as a well-formulated scheme to bring 
men into those relations to their Father in heaven 
which would be joyous and of the family sort; 
that we might be "bound with golden chains 
around the throne of God," or as Zinzendorf said, 
"be chained to the chariot of Christ with chains 
of love." Or as a philosopher has said, " These ex- 
periences may be after all the best key to life's sig- 



A Victorious Defeat 133 

nificance, and possibly the only opener of our eyes 
to the deepest levels of truth." 5 

Certain it is that we all lack the motive power 
to do what we know we ought to do. And we 
have thoughts and emotions that we know we ought 
not to have. But we are powerless to change the 
fountain out of which they come. If our wills can 
be reenforced by something, and if some resolvent 
of evil can be gotten into our hearts, we shall be 
able to do, and to think, and to feel as we ought. 
What the gospel of God does is to make us indebted 
to him for his grace and to Christ for his love ; and 
thus gratitude and affection are made to reenforce 
our wills and change our hearts. It is this entirely 
reasonable view that in the last analysis of reflec- 
tion justifies the way of the gospel, and the system 
of salvation by grace, and it is this which inspires 
the universal hymn : 

O, to grace how great a debtor 

Daily I'm constrained to be ! 
Let thy grace, Lord, like a fetter, 

Bind my wandering heart to thee. 
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it; 

Prone to leave the God I love; 
Here's my heart; Lord, take and seal it; 

Seal it for thy courts above. 

5 Professor James. 



CHAPTER XII 

THE NORMAL WORK OF THE HOLY SPIRIT IN THE 
CHRISTIAN 

Henry Ward Beecher once said of the eighth 
chapter of Romans : " It is the greatest feat of 
moral philosophy that has ever been performed in 
this world. It is deeper, more comprehensive, and 
therefore more difficult in the form in which it 
stands than any other part of the Scriptures. Its 
difficulties arise from the number and importance 
of the truths which pour into it ; for like the Ama- 
zon it drains a continent, and every drop that falls 
upon the farthest mountain or along the valleys 
finds its way hither. So I might say the Bible 
forms a watershed on either side, and that it all 
runs into the eighth chapter of Romans." 

There is much in the chapter to warrant this 
description of it. But Mr. Beecher found much of 
his difficulty because of a misconception he had of 
the whole drift of the apostle's thought. He at- 
tempts to read the chapter as if only two elements 
were involved in it ; one which he calls the " animal 
nature " — " his animal appetites and passions " — 
and the other which he calls the " higher nature," 
" by which he becomes a son of God." This concep- 
tion will not harmonize with the language of the 
134 



The Normal Work of the Holy Spirit 135 

chapter, because it does not harmonize with Paul's 
underlying thought. 

There are in the chapter, not two, but three ele- 
ments or agencies; those which Mr. Beecher men- 
tions, and a third most important one, namely, the 
Spirit of God — the Spirit of life. 

Whether we can identify in ourselves the work- 
ings of this third agency or not, we cannot read the 
apostle's words with any understanding unless we 
have this third agency in mind. 

I desire to pass by other themes that lie near the 
surface of the chapter and to try to transplant some 
of the leading ideas about this Spirit of God as it 
operates in the Christian life. 

And first, we n^ed to get some fairly clear idea 
about this Spirit of God. It is not an easy thing 
to do so. John said that as the wind bloweth, and 
we cannot tell whence it cometh or whither it go- 
eth, so is every one that is born of the Spirit. But 
I think we can all remember times when we seemed 
to be acted upon by something in us but not of us — 
an unsought sense of our own sin ; or a new and 
clearer idea of the goodness of God ; or a strange 
modification in our hearts of our feelings toward 
people whom we had not liked; or an unwonted 
peace of heart in the midst of trial or sorrow. 
These experiences are such that we can only ac- 
count for them by assigning them to an intelligent 
and kindly Some One acting in us for our good. 
That agency is the Spirit of God. 



136 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

This chapter deals with the Christian life as it is 
lived under the influence of that divine Spirit — that 
Spirit of life. 

Let us consider what its activities are. At the 
end of chapter six it was written that we are 
emancipated from. Sin and become servants to God, 
and have in his service the gift of eternal life 
through Jesus Christ our Lord. The next chapter 
is given to answering some queries that might 
arise (ver. 7, 13) ; and at the end of that section 
he says that one who tries to work out his own jus- 
tification finds a law within his members so strong 
that he is constantly brought into captivity to the 
law of Sin. (Ver. 23.) This is so common with 
him that in his despair he cries out, " Who shall 
deliver me from this body of death ? " Then recall- 
ing the gospel message, its plans and provisions, he 
answers his question, saying, " I thank God through 
Jesus Christ our Lord." 

Now in this eighth chapter he returns to the 
thought at the close of the sixth, and says, " There- 
fore there is no condemnation to them that are in 
Christ Jesus." That is, the law of Sin, the tyranni- 
cal master they have been under, can now work no 
sort of condemnation to them. And for this reason, 
namely : those who are by an earnest faith " in 
Christ," have the Spirit-of-life — that is, the life- 
giving Spirit — given them from God, and that 
Spirit sets them free from the law of Sin. 

This freedom has two aspects. One is, that it 



The Normal Work of the Holy Spirit 137 

changes the regime under which men are to live if 
they are " in Christ/' so that they are measured by 
a new standard. The old way having failed, a new 
way has been presented, and they are thus set free 
from the old one. 

But the other aspect is that by the reenforce- 
ment of their own spirits by the " Spirit-of-life " 
they are able to win in the struggle against Sin. 
This aspect is expressed by some as if the passage 
read, " The power of the Spirit-of-life has set us 
free from the power of Sin." The passage has 
been discussed very earnestly; some taking it as 
only theoretically, potentially, ideally true, others 
insisting that it is actually true that the Spirit-of- 
life, not only in theory but in fact, gives actual free- 
dom from Sin. 

I can but think that both are true. The first cer- 
tainly is ; and that would not have any value if the 
other were not its culmination. 

I find, then, the one great truth which we are en- 
titled to keep for ourselves is that the Spirit-of-life 
will give us daily lives triumphant over the tyrant 
Sin. 

And that this is not a mere " minister's theory " 
is evidenced by the men and women who are living 
witnesses of its actuality. Many former drunkards, 
now sober, are unmistakable walking testimonies to 
the power of this Spirit-of-life to free men from the 
drink habit and power. The John Bunyans, the 
John Newtons, the John B. Goughs, the Colonel 



138 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

Hadleys, the Francis Murphys, the Professor Gil- 
mores, the long line of men who march in the col- 
umns of the Salvation Army — all join in a trium- 
phant chorus that says : 

Sought by thy mercy, Lord, 

Saved by thy power, 
Led by thy gracious hand, 

Kept every hour. 
Thine shall the honor be, 

Thine evermore; 
Thy name we glorify, 

Thy name adore. 

If there were no other testimony than that of the 
victors over the rum power in this " body of sin " 
it would decide the value of this Spirit-of-life. 

Listen to the noisy profanity and vulgarity that 
flows from the company of worldlings, and note 
how it ceases when the Spirit of God takes posses- 
sion. Every profane man become prayerful is a 
star witness to the emancipating power of this 
Spirit. 

x\nd here is a company of men changed from 
selfish, greedy, penurious, unhappy men into un- 
selfish, generous, rejoicing supporters of the mis- 
sionary and the charitable work of their communi- 
ties. Summon them all, and let them tell the secret 
of their change. They will say, " It came when 
we committed ourselves to Christ. ,, 

In looking over a whole community, if we see a 
margin of good in one over that of another we find 



The Normal Work of the Holy Spirit 139 

it is due to the average lives of the Christian be- 
lievers there, and that is due to this Spirit-of-life 
imparted to them and working in them in response 
to their faith in Christ Jesus. 

Outside of that circle the old struggle remains. 
The sense of doing what one does not approve, the 
weary, daily consciousness that the Law of Sin is 
master of the field, that he has only been driven 
back to the " old Hindenburg line/' and there de- 
fies us. There is no victory until the " Great Ally " 
comes into the conflict. 

There is a great exhortation and a great word 
of hope for each of you who is struggling alone, 
seeking righteousness perhaps with a real zeal, but 
subject nevertheless to daily defeat; this says you 
can come in as conquerors ; it is within your reach 
to say : " Thanks be to God through Christ Jesus 
our Lord that he has given me victory to-day over 
a temper that has been my master : he has lessened 
the demands of my fleshly appetites and passions, 
and helped me to harness them into a good service ; 
he has given me a better vision of my fellow men 
so that I have taken pleasure in doing them good ; 
life has been worth living to-day ; 

Lord, if I may I'll serve another day." 

We have seen the trees stripped of their leaves 
by the frosts and storms, the fields whitened with 
the winter's snow, the brooks frozen up so they 
did not sing, all the life and joy seemingly gone. 

L 



140 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

But the spring suns, the warm rains, change the 
face of Nature; earth puts on her robes of living 
green; the brooks begin to sing again; and the 
birds respond with their love-songs. No more won- 
derful change can be imagined than that from De- 
cember to June. This is a likeness of the change 
that comes over the moral world when the gospel 
comes in its power. The fear of God gives place to 
the cry, " Our Father " ; bitterness yields to love ; 
passions make way for peace; new songs are put 
into men's mouths; new purposes in their hearts; 
new hopes, new ambitions — all things new. 

" They that are after the Spirit do mind the 
things of the Spirit." 

The word " mind " has a great fulness of mean- 
ing. It comes from a word that means " to think." 
It contains the idea of thinking and then aiming 
at the conclusions of the thinking. To be like- 
minded with Christ is to have the same aims as he. 
To be money-minded is to have money-getting the 
dominant motive in life. The apostle says, " Mind 
not high things, but condescend to men of low es- 
tate." That was written to guard against the de- 
sire to be in what we moderns call " society," 
whether it be good or bad. " Let that mind be in 
you, which was in Christ Jesus." That is, regulate 
your lives by the same dominant motives and aims. 

What is here said is that if men are truly com- 
mitted to Christ, he will give them the aims and 
motives that are agreeable to the Spirit of God. 



The Normal Work of the Holy Spirit 141 

We all know how really decisive our inner aims 
in life are. Our deepest ambitions stand ready all 
the time to become the decisive factor in decisions ; 
they are the " balance of power " in close issues. If 
a minister's aim is to be a great scholar he will de- 
cide between two pastorates for the one that will 
give him time for scholarly research or proximity 
to a university. 

If he has an ambition for notoriety, or to be- 
come a great orator, he finds this ambition tugging 
at his heart like a piece of steel on the magnetic 
needle, influencing his judgment and his tastes. If 
his chief ambition is to " get a crowd," he almost 
unconsciously imitates the speech and antics of a 
Billy Sunday. 

A minister said to me one day, " I am just crazy 
to make money." I noticed that when he got the 
morning paper he did not, like most readers, turn 
to the big headlines of the news columns, but at 
once to the records of the stock-market. Although 
he knew this was not a suitable ambition he did not 
seemingly have control of the deeper currents of 
his own life. 

The same is true among all Christians. Their 
" minds " — that is their deepest aims — determine 
the course of their lives. And for this reason they 
are often troubled because they know their ambi- 
tions are not of the highest grade. 

It seems to me the encouragement of this passage 
is that if we truly commit ourselves to Christ the 



142 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

Spirit of God will work a change in the " fontal 
affections " — in the deepest aims — so that they will 
be brought into harmony with the right things. We 
shall find it true that they that are " of the Spirit " 
will have the " mind of the Spirit " and will aim 
at such things as are in full harmony with his 
mind. 

And I think it will not be confined to having the 
same kindness of spirit, but it will include the same 
breadth of vision. It will lead into what lies be- 
hind the expression " Thy kingdom come." It will 
enlarge the field of sympathy to take in what the 
Great Commission included. It will give not only 
the vision and the kindliness but the patient cour- 
age also. In no small degree it will give us the es- 
timate of our fellow men that he had, and the same 
high faith that they can become his disciples. 

This may not be expected to come as a miracle of 
immediate healing. It will come by various means ; 
chiefly through the channel of better views of the 
truth. In all his works he honors the mental and 
moral constitutions he has given us. 

Another truth contained in the section is that the 
Spirit gives us the sense of being " children of 
God"; witnesses with our spirit that we are such. 
It is an inner testimony. I once read this as if it 
was a conclusion of our intelligence. An aged 
Methodist preacher said to me: " No, friend! It is 
a direct testimony." As I have studied Scripture 
more, but especially as I have studied Christian ex- 



The Normal Work of the Holy Spirit 143 

perience more, I am convinced that the preacher 
was right. There comes into the heart a convic- 
tion that we are the children of God when we can- 
not and do not try to give a logical reason for the 
conviction. The Spirit witnesses with our spirit. 
The testimony of logic will confirm the witness. 
It certainly will dispute a mistaken testimony. 
Reason is not dethroned; it is put where it belongs. 
The fact is that when we have Christ we for the 
first time are able to join in spirit and in truth in the 
prayer, " Our Father in heaven." We have then 
no fear of the throne. We come boldly to the 
throne of grace. We say from the heart, " Father." 
In reading the Psalms we notice how far short of 
the Christian attitude their address to God is. We 
find him regarded as the Lord many times, as God 
generally, then as Shepherd, as Strong Tower, as 
Shield and Buckler, as Deliverer, as King; but no- 
where do we find men coming to the throne in 
prayer as to a Father. It is in the highest moments 
of our own religious life that we utter that first 
word of the Lord's Prayer as the instinctive ex- 
pression of our feelings. 1 

" He maketh intercession for us according to the 
will of God." We never get beyond the need of 
prayer. The more we know of the honor conferred 
upon us, the more we pray to be worthy of it. It 
is the most saintly who are most prayerful. This 
prayer is not for victory over sins so much as it is 

1 Maclaren, " The Mind of the Master," chap. XII. 



144 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

for wisdom and strength to use ourselves to the 
best advantage. The missionary prays for the peo- 
ple to whom he goes; the pastor, for the people 
over whom he is placed as the spiritual teacher; 
the business man, that he may know how to conse- 
crate his talent to the good of the community; the 
parent, that he may bring up his children as he 
ought. It is for such things that we feel our insuffi- 
ciency. And if we knew that we could have, down 
to the smallest detail, everything we should ask 
for, it would stop the fountain of prayer at once; 
for we should be afraid to ask lest we should ask 
amiss. It is on account of such things that we 
welcome the promise that the Spirit intercedes for 
us according to the will of God. 

We have sometimes heard children cry. But 
they could not express their wants in words; nor 
could we interpret their cries ; but the mother knows 
what is the mind of the child's spirit and responds 
to it. So I think our heavenly Father understands 
the groanings that come often from our hearts 
which are the only available expressions of our de- 
sires. When I was a small boy I was intimately 
associated with a very godly man. I rode much 
with him, and often slept with him ; and it used to 
be a mystery to me why he often groaned aloud 
when we were riding along. I knew it was not 
physical pain, but I did not know how to account 
for it. Later in life I learned that it was his great 
spiritual yearnings ; for he was a man of such spirit 



The Normal Work of the Holy Spirit 145 

that he was in prayer for others. Such is what, I 
conceive, the apostle had in mind. These groanings 
are not the groans of fear, nor even of repentance, 
but they are the yearnings of God's Spirit speaking 
in ours — " God working in us to will and to do " — 
longings for more wisdom and more power to do 
good. 

The culmination of all these operations of the 
life-giving Spirit is to be realized in this : " He that 
raised up Christ from the dead shall give life also to 
your mortal bodies, through his Spirit that dwelleth 
in you!' 

The full meaning of this statement appears only 
in connection with what has gone before. In verse 
10 he has said, " The body is dead because of sin, 
but the spirit is life because of righteousness. " 
Christ makes the spirit righteous by giving us the 
mind of his Spirit. So that we have a living spirit 
in a dying body. What he says implies the idea 
that he will do for the body what he has done for 
the spirit. He has already given. life to the spirit; 
he will later give life to your bodies also. That is, 
the redemption will not be completed until the body 
itself is freed from the death that is upon it because 
of sin. In verse 23 he says, " We who have re- 
ceived the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we groan 
within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, namely, 
the redemption of the body." 

This promised victory over death is the culmi- 
nating blessing of the Christian life. 



146 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

Rev. Thomas Armitage, for many years pastor of 
a large church in New York City, said to me dur- 
ing his last weeks of life : " I have always in preach- 
ing tried to get back of the texts to see what was 
the conception out of which they grew. But I 
have always been unable to see why the Scriptures 
speak so lightly of death. It seemed to me that 
death is the king of terrors. It breaks up our 
plans] it disappoints our hopes; it separates fami- 
lies; it robs us of friends. But since I have been 
sick I have come to see that death does not touch 
with its finger anything that is of value to me." 

It may be we are late in seeing this truth. But it 
is in this text very plainly stated. Paul was strong 
in faith to say, and we are encouraged by the same 
Spirit to say : 

Death with thy weapons of war lay me low; 
Strike, King of terrors. I fear not the blow. 
Jesus hath broken the bars of the tomb; 
Joyfully, joyfully, I will go home. 

I have been greatly surprised to find some very 
intelligent people who were troubled about the con- 
ditions of the next world. They had the idea that 
we are to be disembodied, specterlike beings; and 
they shrink from that. And no wonder. Even 
the Greeks and the Romans dreaded Hades. It 
was in their conception a sort of subcellar abode, 
a region of gloom where neither light nor darkness 
prevails. 



The Normal Work of the Holy Spirit 147 

I have been still more surprised to find in litera- 
ture ideas like Bryant's : 

. .-?• Yet a few days and thee 

The all-beholding sun shall see no more 

In all his course. Nor yet in the cold ground, 

Where thy pale form was laid with many tears, 

Nor in the embrace of ocean shall exist 

Thy image. Earth that nourished thee, shall claim 

Thy growth to be resolved to earth again. 

And, lost each human trace, surrendering up 

Thine individual being shalt thou go 

To mix forever with the elements. 

Whatever others may hope for in the world af- 
ter this, the Christian has the " blessed hope " of a 
resurrection. It was this hope for which Paul said 
he was called in question. (Acts 23 : 6.) It was 
this which he said is the culmination of all our 
other hopes, for if Christ be not raised, then we 
have no hope (1 Cor. 15 : 12-19), but if the Spirit 
that raised him from the grave to glory, and to 
honor above every name that is named, dwells in 
us, it will be an easy matter to put endless and 
heavenly life into these mortal bodies. 

There are questions about the conditions of the 
new life that are yet unanswered, but that we shall 
have bodies suited to our new conditions is certain. 
That they will be as much better than these as the 
butterfly's body is better than the body of the worm 
from which it comes, is not unlikely. " It is not 
yet made manifest what we shall be. We know 



148 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

that, if he shall be manifested, we shall be like him ; 
for we shall see him even as he is " (1 John 3:2). 

Alas for him who never sees 
The stars shine through his cypress-trees ! 
Who, hopeless, lays his dead away, 
Nor looks to see the breaking day 
Across the mournful marbles play! 
Who hath not learned, in hours of faith, 
The truth to flesh and sense unknown, 
That Life is ever Lord of Death, 
And Love can never lose its own. 2 

2 Whittier, " Snow-Bound. " 



CHAPTER XIII 

WHAT ABOUT THE JEWS? 

"And so all Israel shall be saved." — Rom. n : 26. 

Paul's teaching in the first eight chapters has been 
a systematic treatment of the divine plan of salva- 
tion. He has said it comes only through faith in 
Christ Jesus. He has told about the excellencies 
of the plan; he has replied to the erroneous infer- 
ences that men might make ; and then he has burst 
forth in that exultant passage : " I am persuaded 
that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor prin- 
cipalities, nor things present, nor things to come, 
nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other 
creature shall be able to separate us from the love 
of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Rom. 

8 : 38, 39). 

Then he turns his thought toward the Jews. He 
knew that many of them were in Rome, and that 
they would hear this letter, or hear about it. They 
would raise the question : " What about us ? You 
have done away with our ceremonies ; you have de- 
nied the actual safety even in our good ethical con- 
duct; you have said we are all under condemna- 
tion. What about God's word to Israel? Has 
he forgotten his covenant? Or does he think it 

149 



150 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

a temporary affair to be set aside at his plea- 
sure? " 

In what constitutes in our version chapters 9, 
10, 11 of his letter Paul deals with this matter with 
much care and fulness. 

Although it has little or no application to us, it 
is nevertheless an interesting and important matter. 
Many people exalt it into almost a vital matter. 
It has become more closely related to us in America 
because of the great numbers of Jews among our 
citizenship. In the latest census, about 2,000,000 
are reported; 143,000 families are connected with 
their 1,800 congregations. 1 

This people is growing both in numbers and 
in influence. They are loyal to the government, in- 
dustrious and prosperous in business. Drunkenness 
is rare among them. Their zeal for their own re- 
ligion is great. And more than all, they are in- 
cluded in our commission to preach to all men the 
riches of Christ. For these reasons a study of 
Paul's discussion will be enlightening. 

It must be noted at the outset of the study that 
Paul was writing to those who knew the prophetic 
books well. And he knew them well. The ques- 
tion was not one of curiosity, but one of great im- 

1 According to the American Jewish Year Book just issued there 
are 1,500,000 Jews in New York City. This is nearly one-half the 
total number in this country, and makes New York the largest Jew- 
ish community ever gathered in a single municipality. < Other fig- 
ures for the city are 2,200 Jewish congregations; 180 religious schools 
with 41,403 pupils; more than 100 Jewish recreational and cultural 
agencies; more than 1,000 mutual aid societies; 965 lodges; 193 
economic agencies, and 164 philanthropic and correctional agencies. 



What About the Jews? 151 

portance to them. We may therefore expect that 
he would put into his reply all that was vital, and 
inferentially what he left out has little importance. 

Reading his discussion carefully, we note that 
there are several ideas that are made emphatic. 

The word of God has not come to nought. From 
outward appearances one might be led to think it 
had. For it is plain that the great mass of the 
descendants of Abraham were not believers in 
Christ, nor even included in the Jewish church. 
There were the descendants of the ten tribes that 
made up the northern kingdom of Israel after the 
secession movement under Solomon's son. Then 
outside of them were the descendants of Esau. 
There must therefore be some line of demarcation 
between the inheritors of the promise to Abraham 
and those who were not his heirs, between those 
who were called children and those who were not. 
To lay a foundation for his argument he says, 
" They are not all Israel that are of Israel/' That 
is, the name " Israel " belongs only to a part of the 
natural descendants of Israel. In another instance 
also the same statement is made, " Neither, because 
they are Abraham's seed, are they all children " (of 
God). It is only with a part of Abraham's de- 
scendants that the covenant was made. Only a part 
can claim any promise. If therefore the covenant 
does not fail with this selected portion it does not 
fail at all. The members of the other portion, what- 
ever may be their status, are not involved in the 



152 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

covenant that Paul is here discussing. It is this se- 
lect portion that he calls the " true Israel," or the 
" children of God," or the " children of promise." 

This selection was made by God himself. This 
he shows by citing the case of Isaac, of whom it was 
written, " In Isaac shall thy seed be called." That 
is, not all of Isaac's descendants, but some out from 
among them. It was not at that time shown what 
part of his descendants would be thus honored. 

Later in the history it is recorded that " before 
they were born, and before either had done good 
or evil," and therefore not by reason of any merit 
in him, it was said, " the elder shall serve the 
younger." That indicates the portion of the 
" seed " of Isaac that will be honored — the younger 
of these two sons of Isaac — that is, Jacob. 

The same idea from another standpoint is set 
forth in a quotation from the record concerning 
Pharaoh : " For this very purpose have I raised 
thee up, that I might show in thee my power, and 
that my name might be published abroad in all the 
earth" (Rom. 9 : 17). And again the words to 
Moses, " I will have mercy on whom I will have 
mercy and I will have compassion on whom I will 
have compassion" (Rom. 9 : 15). 

Thus Paul has made it plain that both the selec- 
tion of the " seed " and the direction of things 
among the outside world are made by God alone. 

This idea runs all through Paul's writings. In 
chapter eight he says : " Whom he foreknew, them 



What About the Jews? 153 

he foreordained to be conformed to the image of 
his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many 
brethren. And whom he foreordained, them he 
also called; and whom he called he justified; and 
whom he justified he glorified. " The whole process 
from creation to glorification is thus conceived of 
as animate with God's purpose as a tree is controlled 
by the purpose to bear fruit. 

In Ephesians he has the same idea : " Having 
foreordained us unto adoption as sons, . . accord- 
ing to the good pleasure of his own will, . . having 
made known unto us the mystery of his will, ac- 
cording to his good pleasure which he purposed in 
himself'' (Eph. 1 : 5, 9). 

If one were to sift out from Paul's life and 
writings all that is confessedly dependent on the 
idea that God was directing, there would not be 
enough left to be worth preserving. 

Because some were disposed to make this superb 
faith in God an excuse for their sins did not deter 
him from speaking the truth about it. To him 
God was all in all. And unto him were all things. 

God's will must be accepted as right. Some one 
would naturally raise the query whether it was fair 
in God to select for his favor a part of mankind 
and leave the others out. We all appreciate the 
force of such a query. Paul answers it by an ap- 
peal to their sense of the fitness of things. " Shall 
the thing formed say unto him that formed it, Why 
didst thou make me thus? Has not the potter a 



154 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

right over the clay, . . to make one vessel unto 
honor and another unto dishonor?" 

"Who art thou that repliest against God?" 
This reply does not at once meet the case of a man 
who makes the inquiry. It has the unwelcome 
flavor of an autocratic smothering of the question, 
as if to ask it were a sort of lese-majeste, as the 
French would call it. No one of the hundreds of 
writers on this part of the chapter has failed to 
discuss the difficulty supposed to reside in the ac- 
ceptance of the full sovereignty of God. This 
shows that there is a sort of necessity to discuss it. 
But Paul was not writing to unthoughtful people. 
He expected they would go deep into the case. 
Does not the mind of man of natural necessity fall 
back on the sovereignty of God as the solution of 
all things? Does not the very idea of God imply 
autocratic determination ? Would any one be satis- 
fied to think that there is no control, no plan, no 
sure " divinity that shapes our ends, rough-hew 
them how we will " ? Whatever Paul's mind might 
have seen in the case, he had such a high and 
worthy idea of God's grace that he was willing to 
trust in his autocratic control with comfort of mind, 
assured that only loving-kindness was back of it all. 
He would join with the poet Cowper in saying: 

Judge not the Lord by feeble sense, 

But trust him for his grace ; 
Behind a frowning providence 

He hides a smiling face. 



What About the Jezvs? 155 

It seemed to him also that the Christian people 
who were the recipients of God's great grace were 
the ones most obligated to trust the sovereignty 
of God without cavil or mistrust. 

With whom did he make the covenant? If all 
are not " Israel " that are the natural descendants 
of him, who are? If not all that have Abraham's 
blood in their veins are included in the select com- 
pany, who are included ? He says only the " chil- 
dren of promise." But what is meant by a " child 
of promise " ? He means one who has his special 
blessings and his place in this select company by 
reason of a promise that God has made and ful- 
filled by introducing into the natural order of things 
his own supernatural help. In the case of Isaac, 
his mother was long past the age at which women 
bear children, but a child was promised and was 
born according to the promise. In the case of 
Jacob the natural order of men would have made 
the elder to rule, but in this case the elder is to 
serve the younger in accordance with a promise 
and the introduction of a special help later on. 

It is such as these with whom the covenant is 
made. They are " Israel." 

But now Paul begins to look for the larger mean- 
ing of the promise. He would define the matter 
more fully. What are the limits of this company 
of selects ? In the larger sense " they that have 
faith like Abraham are children and heirs accord- 
ing to promise." " We, as Isaac was, are children 

M 



156 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

of promise " (Gal. 4 : 28), " which contains an alle- 
gory " about spiritual things. This broadening of 
the limits of the company, he says, was foretold by 
the prophet Hosea when he said, " I will call that 
my people, which was not my people; and her be- 
loved, that was not beloved. And in the place 
where it was said, Ye are not my people, there shall 
they be called sons of the living God." Peter had 
the same idea when he said, in his address at Pente- 
cost, " The promise is unto . . . even as many as 
the Lord our God shall call." 

What about the men of real faith among the 
Jews not believers? There were then and are now 
many Jews of such sort as Nicodemus and Joseph 
of Arimathaea ; and many priests ; and thousands of 
whom James said, " They are all believers, but are 
very zealous for the law " — such as are here said to 
be " zealous for God, but not according to knowl- 
edge." If these are the " remnant " of which the 
prophets spoke (Rom. 11 : 4), and are "children 
of God by faith," and hence in the covenant, why 
are they not believers ? And if they are not, what is 
their status ? He says, " Blindness in part has hap- 
pened to them." They see the unity and holiness 
of God, but they do not see that Christ is the Mes- 
siah. As Paul verily thought he ought to oppose 
Christ until he saw the truth about him more fully, 
so these are failing to get the full benefit of their 
covenant with God because they are in part blind 
to it. The fault does not lie in their faith but in 



What About the Jews? 157 

their knowledge. They cling to the ceremonial, 
and to the national idea that Jerusalem must be the 
place for perfect worship of God. They are not 
yet open-eyed to the wider mercy of God that 
takes the Gentiles into the select company whenever 
they have faith. 

They are not cast off. God is still their God. 
They have stumbled, but they have not fallen. Nay, 
their stumbling is a part of the divine plan for 
being merciful to others. What appears so myste- 
rious will be found to have had a glorious termi- 
nation. 

The Epistle to the Galatians and the one to He- 
brews were written to open the eyes of these 
faith-posse'ssing but partly blinded " heirs of the 
promises " to the riches of their possessions. The 
apostle prays that the eyes of their understanding 
may be opened, that they may know the riches of 
their inheritance, the hope of their calling, and the 
power of God toward them. (Eph. 1 : 18-20.) The 
writer of Hebrews attempts to show them how the 
ceremonial law was only a shadow of good things to 
come, but that now the real thing is at hand. 
(Heb. 10 : 1.) 

But this blindness is not permanent. For a time 
these people are cut off from the full blessings of 
God's covenant. When the fulness of the Gentiles 
has accepted Christ, then these will be led to see 
that Christ is after all the one whom God sent to 
be the Messiah, and will turn to him in great num- 



158 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

bers. So, as it is written, " all Israel will be 
saved." They will be grafted again into the great 
olive tree of God's church, and though later in the 
history, will not be deprived of any part of the 
blessing. 

Such then is Paul's reply to the question, What 
about the Jews? Summed up it is- this: By the 
determinate counsel of God, a typical covenant was 
made with a select portion of Israel. This class 
was composed of those who were influenced and 
helped by the supernatural power of God; in the 
exercise of his own good pleasure he enlarged it 
to include all who in any time or place would in 
faith accept his help. A part of them have been 
slow in seeing the fulness of the blessing, but later 
will have their eyes open and then be welcomed to 
the kingdom. 

Into what are they to come? This is an impor- 
tant question. When they are "grafted in again," 
what is to be their condition? They are to come 
into the same things that others came into. They 
differ in no particulars whatever from Gentile con- 
verts to Christ. In Ephesians the apostle writes, 
" God hath broken down the middle wall of parti- 
tion between us," and all belong to the kingdom, 
nay, more, they are " members of the household of 
faith," built into the temple of God for his habi- 
tation. They were in sin " together " ; they will be 
" quickened together," " raised up together," made 
to "sit together in heavenly places" (Eph. 2 : 



What About the Jews? 159 

5,6). " There is neither Greek nor Jew, circum- 
cision nor uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, 
bondman, freeman, but Christ is all, and in all " 
(Col. 3 : 11). All believers come in at the same 
door of mercy. It leads to the same level of honor. 
It is not higher nor lower. " The same God who 
is rich toward all that call upon him " is God of 
both. " That with one accord ye may with one 
mouth glorify the God and Father of our Lord " 
(Rom. 15 : 6). 

It is a noteworthy fact that every mature Chris- 
tian individual passes psychologically through the 
very steps that are recorded in the history of Israel. 
First, a dim confused idea of God, then a sense of 
duty to be his obedient people, then a growing sense 
of the sinfulness which must put a veil over our 
faces, then a knowledge of his grace in providing 
a Messiah, and then the sense of being in full 
harmony with him and the object of his constant 
care and thought. As through all the history, 
mingled with many misconceptions, there runs a 
deep sense of God guiding in some way toward a 
better state of things, so in the individual life. 
It is to this latter consciousness that the Christian 
is to come. And to this the remnant are to come, 
for all of that faith-possessing Israel will be saved. 

As a necessary inference, then, there is no call 
for the Christian Jew to go back to Jerusalem any 
more than for the Gentile. There is no room for 
the temple, for they that worship God worship 



160 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

neither at Jerusalem nor Gerizim, but anywhere in 
spirit and in truth. (John 4 : 23.) There is no 
room for sacrifices, for Christ was the reality of 
which the sacrifices were the shadow. (Heb. 10 : I.) 
There is no circumcision, for " neither circumcision 
availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new 
creature" (Gal. 6 : 15). 

If there is any racial feeling that prompts Jews 
to go back to Jerusalem, it is their privilege to do 
so. If they can unite in the formation of a sepa- 
rate nation, it woulcl doubtless be admitted into the 
family of nations. But all this would have no rela- 
tion to the Christian faith. To endeavor to put 
the Christian future of a Christian Jew into the 
earthly conditions and the narrow bounds of Pales- 
tine is as futile as to try and put the luscious apple 
back into a blossom. 

The writers of the New Testament all agree in 
presenting the teaching that the whole Jewish re- 
gime of both ceremonial and national character is 
done away in Christ. It is not to be dishonored, 
not " outgrown," but " grown out of." When the 
birdlings are soaring in the sky, why rebuild the 
nest in which they were hatched? 

This brief survey gives us full sympathy with 
Paul when thinking of the matter he wrote : " O 
the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and the 
knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his 
judgments, and his ways past finding out ... To 
him be the glory for ever " (Rom. 11 : 33, 36). 



CHAPTER XIV 



THE CHRISTIAN LITURGY 



In the Metropolitan Museum in New York City 
there is a rare collection of pottery, gold and silver 
jewelry, and precious stones. The jewelry shows 
the most delicate workmanship. The stones were 
cut by masters in the art. Thousands of dollars 
would not now buy the bare precious metal, while 
the value to the archeologist and the historian is 
inestimable. This wonderful collection was found 
in the island of Cyprus, in the Mediterranean, in 
the decade preceding the year 1876, by General 
Cesnola. It was found in the depths of vaults cut 
in the rock underneath a temple that was destroyed 
six hundred years before Paul was in Cyprus on 
his first missionary journey. (Acts 13 : 4.) These 
treasures were votive and thank-offerings made by 
devout worshipers in the temple. They bear a mute 
and touching testimony to the sense of gratitude 
those people felt for mercies they ascribed to their 
gods, and their desire to make some worthy expres- 
sion of it. 

This is a common trait in all races and ages. 
Among the Jews it was cultivated and provided for 
by a liturgy containing both sacrifices and thank- 
offerings. 

161 



162 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

The psalmist said : " What shall I render unto 
Jehovah for all his benefits toward me? I will take 
the cup of salvation and call upon the name of the 
Lord. I will pay my vows unto Jehovah. Yea in 
the presence of all his people" (Ps. 116 : 12-14). 
The people sang to one another : " Enter into his 
gates with thanksgiving and into his courts with 
praise" (Ps. 100 : 4) ; "Ascribe unto Jehovah the 
glory due unto his name: bring an offering, and 
come into his courts" (Ps. 96 : 8). Mary was 
moved to pour out the precious ointment upon the 
head of Jesus as her expression of her gratitude. 
(Matt. 26 : 6.) We notice in our day that the 
time when men are most ready to make generous 
contributions to charities and missions is after a 
great sense of spiritual awakening. This has been 
taken advantage of by covetous preachers who have 
left the regular pastorates because they expected to 
get great financial returns. The appropriate feel- 
ing is capitalized by unworthy men. But the abuse 
of it by some does not invalidate the right use of it. 
When a man realizes the mercy of God to him 
there springs up at once the desire to make some 
sort of return for it. As it is boorish for children 
to receive gifts and not say " Thank you," so it is in 
larger matters a kind of spiritual boorishness, a 
lack of religious courtesy, not to desire to say a 
great " Thank you " to the Giver of spiritual gifts. 
A clear view of any of God's attributes awakens 
response in the heart of a well-brought-up Chris- 



The Christian Liturgy 163 

tian. A sight of his holiness arrays us against sin. 
A sight of his wondrous works in earth and sky 
so impressed the Indian that it 

. . . bowed 
His spirit with the thought of boundless power 
And inaccessible majesty, 

and led him 

In the darkling wood, 
Amid the cool and silence, to kneel down, 
And offer to the Mightiest solemn thanks 
And supplication. 

The justice of God awakens the fires of right- 
eousness in men. His mercy moves us to compas- 
sion. All feel the need of some suitable expression 
of gratitude. The Romans had reason to be per- 
plexed over this matter. Paul had taught them 
that circumcision, which was a pledge to keep the 
whole law of the temple, was not important. They 
were taught that the death of Jesus was the reality 
of which the sin-offering was the shadow ; and now 
that he had come the shadow was of no use. The 
city of Jerusalem was of no importance to the Chris- 
tians at Rome. Paul might have a remnant of racial 
pride, and a sediment of his former reverence to- 
ward the holy place, but he did not teach others to 
esteem Jerusalem or its temple as important. They 
came to the sabbaths and to the Passovers with no 
part to take. They saw the offerings of others and 



164 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

had none of their own. No doubt there was mental 
perplexity, and some heart-lonesomeness. " What 
are we to do? What is our liturgy? What do you 
give us in place of the other service we were glad 
to render ? " 

He begins this section of his letter with the 
words : " Present your bodies living sacrifices, holy 
and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable 
liturgy," or as the revision has it, your " spiritual 
service V 

Let us notice at the outset the exhortation in 
detail. 

"Present your bodies/' that is, bring them, in 
thought, and turn them over to God. Settle it in 
your heart that your bodies are no more in your 
absolute possession than the offerings in the tem- 
ple were in the possession of the offerer after he 
had presented them at the temple. 

" Your bodies/' that is, all the powers of your 
bodies; the sum total of the faculties with which 
your bodies are endowed. It includes the power 
of hands. It contains the affections of the heart. 
It turns over the workings of your minds. 

"Living sacrifices!' Here is the great idea of 
his exhortation. The sacrifices of the old ritual 
were to be dead ones. They were to be burned on 
the altar. They went up in smoke or were dissolved 
in the fragrance of incense. These sacrifices of ours 

1 The Greek word is latreian; see also Rom. 9:4; Heb. 9:1; 
where the word is translated " service." 



The Christian Liturgy 165 

are to be used in practical service of the Lord's 
kingdom. This is an important word in his teach- 
ing. It is very common to limit the meaning of the 
word sacrifice to only one part of its meaning. 
People seem to think that the mere act of going 
without is a sacrifice. In Syria there was a class 
of men who are called stylites. They stood up in 
public places for years, getting their food from those 
who thought it a great honor to minister to such 
holy devotees. Their error was that they thought 
" going without " was a sacrifice ; that to waste 
energy by standing up for no good purpose was a 
service to God. This error is not wholly out of 
fashion now. Thus a woman gives up the God- 
given function of wifehood and motherhood, think- 
ing to be holier than the common woman by living 
in a convent. Men give up the duty of citizens and 
fathers to retire into monasteries and live apart 
from the temptations of the world. In lesser degree 
women in the churches " give up " social functions, 
thinking it is a sort of holy action to " give up " 
something they like. Surely this is not the wish 
of God, it was not the thought of Paul, that bodily 
powers are to be dwarfed, mutilated, shriveled, and 
then brought to God as a sacrifice acceptable to 
him. Suppose a woman should come and say, 
" Lord, here is my voice, I have denied myself the 
pleasure of singing " ; or a man should say : " Here 
is my body ; for thy sake I have refused to cultivate 
my muscles ; and I have stopped reading and think- 



1 66 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

ing; I laid them all on the altar of religion." It is 
not irreverent to say that God would reply : " Yes, 
your talent for music you did not use for the com- 
fort of men; you hid it in a napkin; your bodily 
strength entrusted to you for my service you abused 
and neglected until now you are a walking drug- 
store instead of a temple of the Holy Spirit; your 
mind, which was to be trained to see and know my 
glorious power in the universe, is shriveled and 
weak ; now do you come and offer to me that faded, 
shelf-worn kind of remnant as a sacrifice ?" These 
are not" living sacrifices "; they are only the husks 
with the ears lost out. No ! this is not what is re- 
quired of an intelligent and faithful disciple. He 
is to cultivate all his powers of body and mind 
thoughtfully ; and put his powers, according to his 
best judgment, into the work that his Master has 
set all his people to do in this world, making his 
kingdom to come in all places. 

" Which is your reasonable liturgy." That is, in 
view of all that has been given us and done for us 
by our Lord and Master, the most rational way to 
serve him is not simply to sing praises — though that 
is a part of the service — but to enlist in the prosecu- 
tion of his great work — not of " making the world 
safe for democracy," but — of making democracy 
fit for the world, and making the world safe for 
democracy. We are not able to do it all: we are 
only junior partners in the task; but our part is a 
necessary one, and our duty is to do it faithfully. 



The Christian Liturgy 167 

If this examination of Paul's thought makes any 
serious impression upon us we are prompted at once 
to ask: " How can we fulfil the exhortation? What 
in detail are the specific things that we can do ? " 

There are many lines in which our minds natu- 
rally run out in reply to this query; but we shall 
do well if we follow the lines that the apostle him- 
self followed. 

There is no very marked order in his treatment, 
but some lines of division are found. The twelfth 
chapter has two sections, one concerning the rela- 
tion of the individual to the whole church, the other 
concerning Christian love. Then in the thirteenth 
chapter he speaks of the duties to the state. 

In a general statement he says we are not to 
take the world or its fashions as our guide or 
model. But as our ideals of life are to be conformed 
to Christ's ideal, we are to let them and not the 
fashion of the world shape our outward conduct in 
a good and acceptable manner. 

Then he speaks of our relation to the church. 
Xo paraphrase can add much to the beauty or force- 
fulness of this exhortation. The important basis 
of it is the idea that the individual is a part of the 
body of Christ. That is, no one is to think of his 
gifts as to be used for himself alone or his own 
glory. The individual is not to be isolated from 
the rest of the church. He is not to be a sort of 
bushwhacker, fighting according to his own no- 
tions, be they ever so brave, but to think of him- 



i68 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

self as one of many and to coordinate his work 
with theirs. This statement has in it the central 
principle of the best sociological spirit. 

But some of its condensed statements will gain 
in force if we look carefully at them. 

" Be not more high-minded than you ought to 
be minded/' is a fair translation. That is not by 
any means an exhortation to think little of one's 
self. No man has a right to underestimate his own 
value in the community, and in his church. Every 
man has a value to all the others. But let him 
think it out soberly and according as God has given 
him faith. " If our work is to preach, then our 
preaching must correspond to our faith; if it is to 
minister to others, then we must devote ourselves to 
our work. The teacher must devote himself to his 
teaching; the speaker to his exhortation. Those 
who distribute charity must distribute with gener- 
ous hearts ; those who do acts of kindness must do 
them in a cheerful spirit." 2 

In a school for teachers in New York State one 
of the teachers was receiving a kind criticism of 
her work, and she was exhorted to " put more joy 
into it." This is what Paul meant by " doing with 
cheerfulness." It is not an infrequent thing to hear 
even ministers say, " I've got to preach next Sun- 
day," as though it was an irksome task. The man 
who has not joy in preaching is only fifty per cent 
efficient. The man who doles out the " poor fund " 

2 Twentieth Century New Testament. 



The Christian Liturgy 169 

of the church as if he was sorry to part with it, is 
not doing his work as he ought. It ought to be 
true that, while the church is sorry that any one 
needs financial help, there is such a great tone of 
gladness that the church is able to minister to the 
need that it sweetens the bitter waters of mortifica- 
tion on the part of those who receive the help. 

"Diligent in business" ; so the common version 
reads. But that is as inaccurate a rendering as one 
can make; for the original has no reference to 
" business " as we use the word. The Revised 
makes it read, " in diligence not slothful." Better 
than either of these is, " When earnestness is called 
for, be not slow to supply it." It is said of John 
Adams' wife that at one time when he was going 
away on some public business, she said to him, 
" John, do not shilly-shally." That is a fair repre- 
sentation of Paul's thought. Do not shilly-shally 
in any thing that it is duty to do. Jesus put it in 
good phrase when he said that the great command- 
ment is, " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with 
all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all 
thy mind" (Matt. 22 : 37). 

" Take thought for things honorable in the sight 
of all men." The Christian life is not an unearthly 
one. It is founded on the deepest experiences and 
instincts of men. To go contrary to the universal 
moral ideas of mankind is surely to go against the 
Christian morality. Christian morality is never con- 
tradictory to natural morality, but in many things 



170 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

carries natural morality to its best development, and 
then goes beyond. But the great power of Chris- 
tian ethics is in the new motives and the enlistment 
of the affections for the help of the intelligence in 
doing the right. 

The " man of God " is a constant quantity for 
many centuries back. Whatever may be the age of 
the Old Testament writings, the ideal man has not 
changed much since the Scriptures were written. 

The thirty-first chapter of Job does not need 
apology in the light of the New Testament. And 
even in the Jewish extra-biblical writings the ideal 
does not fall below. For example, in the Testa- 
ments of the Twelve Patriarchs we read : " Keep, 
my children, the law of God . . . not playing the 
busybody with the business of thy neighbor. But 
love the Lord and your neighbor. Have compas- 
sion on the poor and weak . . . offering gifts to the 
Lord with thanksgiving." And again, about for- 
giveness it was written, " If a man be shameless and 
persisteth in his wrong-doing, even so forgive him 
from the heart and leave to God the avenging." 

"The precepts of the peoples before Moses' 
time," said Dr. Howard Osgood, " would go far 
toward making a reverent, clean-minded, gently 
spoken, diligent, discreet, respectful, independent, 
straightforward man ; far from pride of place or of 
knowledge, as well as from the viler forms of life. 
He would be supremely careful of his home, his 
wife, and children, to guard them from foes within 



The Christian Liturgy 171 

and without, that they might live soberly and truth- 
fully, with an eye upon that day when they must lie 
in the valley." 

"Avenge not yourselves. . . Vengeance is mine; 
I will recompense, saith the Lord" This needs es- 
pecial thought just now when the natural sense of 
injury and the natural resentment are roused against 
almost every form of cruelty and dishonor as prac- 
tised by the Germans against nearly all the world. 
Just what is the duty of the Christian people to de- 
mand of the government concerning the leaders of 
the barbarities it is not easy to say. But we need 
not be careful about saying that we may not do any- 
thing for vengeance. We may need to do some se- 
vere things as a preventive or as an exhibition of 
public abhorrence of such things as have been per- 
petrated by the leaders, but we need to suppress 
and pray against the spirit of vengeance. That be- 
longs to God, and he will not fail in justice. 

Such then are the outlines of the kind of life 
that Paul thought becomes those who are justified 
by faith through the grace of God. It has been 
written of Lieutenant Farre, a noted artist in 
France, who enlisted in the aviation service, that he 
invented a system of recording as he flew the colors 
and scenes about and below him ; and then after he 
went to earth again he painted from these sugges- 
tions a noted set of pictures. 3 

8 See "Ladies' Home Journal," Sept., 1918. 

N 



172 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

These " notes " of Paul, sailing in the higher 
realms, if taken as sketches only and filled out 
in daily life, will give us the most perfect men 
and women the earth knows. Let each one of 
these short exhortations of this chapter alone be 
filled out in a natural and logical way, and we 
shall have the ideal human life. Its beauty has 
never been discredited. Its usefulness has not 
been denied. It was said by Mr. Herbert Spencer 
that probably a " rationalized version of the Chris- 
tian creed " would at the end of the evolutionary 
process be finally adopted. And when this process 
is finished it will be found that all its essential fea- 
tures were here given to the world. 



CHAPTER XV 

THE CHRISTIAN AND THE STATE 

"Let every soul be in subjection to the higher pow- 
ers." — Rom. 13 : i. 

This subject, always important, has had an extra 
interest owing to the world war that has been in 
progress and the demands made on the citizens for 
money and for men to carry it on. Many people 
were much perplexed concerning their duty. We 
have been taught, and we have approved the teach- 
ing, that war is sinful. We have been in hearty 
agreement with General Sherman's statement that 
" war is hell. ,, We say it with no taint or tint of 
irreverence. il War is hell." For hell in the last 
analysis is simply the ripened fruit of somebody's 
wrong-doing. As we get first-fruits of the heavenly 
harvest in the happiness that comes to us when we 
do right, so we get an earnest of the ultimate hell 
in the preliminary results of wrong-doing. 

It may be the wrong-doing of a state in which we 
are so interwoven that we share in the suffering 
without individual choice of wrong-doing. The 
Civil War in our country in 1861 was the result of 
the wrong-doing of the States in permitting slavery 
to exist as it had. Or, it may be the wrong-doing of 

173 



174 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

a little coterie of mortals called the " royal family " 
whose ambitions lead them to make war for mere 
selfish satisfaction. In 1913 Baroness Sutten of 
Austria was in this country speaking in behalf of 
international peace. In one of her addresses at 
Drexel Institute, she said : " Why do they say of 
Austria or Germany that ' she ' has declared war ? 
The ' shes ' have nothing to do with it. War comes 
from a few lords and dukes and the Krupp family." 
In such cases the common people have little to do 
but suffer the evils of war, not its guilt. Neverthe- 
less these few and the Krupp family brought on a 
war, and the war is the hell into which their wrong- 
doing has crystallized. 

This war came from the shameless violation of 
solemn treaty agreements; from the infamous con- 
duct of German soldiers who in Belgium abused 
women, slaughtered babies, and pillaged homes; 
from the impudent forbidding of our ships to sail 
the seas that are the property of all; from the 
unparalleled crime of sinking hundreds of non- 
combatants in the Lusitania; and the threats to 
come here and enforce hypocritical cant about rul- 
ing by " divine right." These were the causes of 
this war. Whether America was right or wrong 
in doing so, the people of America — including the 
" shes " — were very unanimous in deciding that we 
ought to go to the rescue of the weak and the de- 
fense of ourselves. 

In spite of the impulse to gt), we in some quiet 



The Christian and the State 175 

moments, as we read the reports of losses and were 
made to feel the cost in many ways, have reviewed 
the case and asked : " Were we right in entering 
the war? Have we any Christian principle that 
warrants it? Are we showing lack of faith in the 
teachings of Jesus that when one smites us on one 
cheek we should turn the other also? Or that we 
should love our enemies and do good to them that 
despitefully use us ? Or the teaching of Paul him- 
self in this same letter, ' Overcome evil with 
good'?" 

Jesus is called the Prince of Peace. How can his 
ministers, standing in Christian pulpits, on the 
Christian Sabbath, with the Christian book in their 
hands, encourage Christian people to go and help 
kill the enemies? or even support with prayers and 
money those who do? 

Those who ask these questions are not pro- 
German; nor are they lacking in what is called 
patriotism, or courage. Their question is whether 
there is a law superior to the law of the state and of 
society, and if so does it forbid them to war ? 

We may not expect Paul to answer all the ques- 
tions we of this day may desire to ask of him. He 
was writing to Romans in the time of the Csesars. 
He did not attempt to say what are the ethics of 
war 7 nor what are the duties of Christian citizens 
if a foreign people invades their country with hos- 
tile intent ; nor what we ought to say about stand- 
ing armies and large navies; nor what is the duty 



176 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

of the Christian citizen about enlistment in time of 
war. Of these and other questions growing out of 
our intricate and complex civilization he said noth- 
ing directly. If one is looking for a " Thus saith the 
Lord " on this matter, he will find but little if any 
satisfaction. 

But while this is true, a closer look at his writ- 
ings discovers evidence that in his mind were cer- 
tain ideas which, allowed to have their full force, 
would go far toward giving a reply to our modern 
questionings. 

There were in his time three leading opinions 
about the relation of Christians to the state ; and to 
all of them Paul was addressing his word in this 
section. 

One class held that civil governments were under 
the direction of demons. This world belongs to 
Satan, and the Christians have no business meddling 
with its government. They are aliens living in a 
foreign country for a while. They have no more 
to do with the governments than an American has 
when he lives for a time in Turkey or China. They 
quote Peter as saying, " I beseech you as strangers 
and pilgrims. ,, 

Another class regarded the Roman government 
as an unholy usurpation of power; and they felt no 
moral obligation to do more than to submit until 
an opportunity arose to throw off the yoke that so 
grievously galled them. They were the ones who 
asked Jesus if it was lawful to pay tribute to Caesar. 



The Christian and the State 177 

A third class, to which probably Paul might be 
said to belong, thought the time of the Saviour's 
return was near at hand. He wrote, " The night is 
far spent, the day is at hand" (Rom. 13 : 12). 
" The time is shortened, that henceforth those that 
have wives be as though they had none, and those 
that weep as though they wept not" (1 Cor. 7 : 
29, 30) . " Establish your hearts ; for the coming of 
the Lord is at hand" (James 5:8). If such was 
their expectation, the character of the government 
was of little account. The main thing was to be 
safe while they remained. So Paul wrote to Tim- 
othy : " I exhort therefore, that . . . supplications, 
prayers, intercessions, thanksgivings, be made for 
. . . kings and all that are in high place ; that we 
may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness 
and gravity" (1 Tim. 2 : 1, 2). 

Add to these differing views of the state the fact 
that the state itself — which meant the aristocrats 
of power — regarded the Christians with a degree 
of suspicion lest they were a group of malcontents 
disposed to deny the authority of the emperor. 

In the presence then of such elements, Paul 
wrote, " Let every soul be in subjection to the higher 
powers." And then he goes on to give his reasons. 
These reasons are of perpetual validity. 

First, " the powers that be " — that is, civil govern- 
ments — u are ordained of God!' Not that God had 
specially organized the Roman government, but the 
Creator wrought the need for civil government into 



178 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

the very constitution of society. As this is the great 
major premise of Paul's thought, it will make his 
teaching clear if we consider the statement he 
makes. Every nation must have some form of 
government to give it either unity or safety. A na- 
tion is a group of people so organized that some 
one or more of its citizens represent it and speak 
for it. Whether it be for mutual welfare or for 
safety from enemies, there must be those whose 
business it is to speak for the nation, and to direct 
its affairs, and provide for its continuance. We 
see the value of government if we suppose all gov- 
ernment to be taken away. Then we have an- 
archy — that is, no archon. Russia is an example of 
what happens when there is no ruling body. Every 
man takes upon himself the task of avenging his 
injuries, of collecting his dues, of defending by 
force his home. Even the anarchists at the out- 
set deny their creed by electing a Lenine or a 
Trotsky to lead them in their fight for anarchy. 
The Jews well knew the results of such a condition, 
for their books told them of a time when there were 
no judges in Israel, but every man did what was 
right in his own sight. (Judg. 21 : 25.) 

Every community in every age has been obliged 
to frame some sort of government. Three families 
cannot live together without something in the na- 
ture of a government. Superior wisdom or strength 
always puts some one at the head of the others and 
gives him the duty to speak and act for the others. 



The Christian and the State 179 

It is for this reason we say God ordains the 
" powers that be." 

When a nation becomes large, and occupies a 
great territory, the necessity for government be- 
comes all the more imperative. 

And with the increasing numbers the demands 
on the government become more numerous and 
complex. In our own enlarging country, how many 
things are now demanded from the government that 
formerly were not considered any part of its 
responsibility. 

There are common roads to be laid out, built, 
and maintained. There are schools to support and 
direct. There are legislatures to elect and support. 
Charitable institutions are to be supported. There 
are franchises to be regulated, sewers and water 
systems to provide for, health measures of a public 
character to inaugurate. Then the rights of the 
public for railroads and commerce are to be defined 
and maintained. In addition to these honorable and 
laudable tasks there is the necessary one of restrain- 
ing crime and policing the land. One has only to 
think of these things to see that a strong and wise 
government is a necessity for the comfort and 
safety of the people. It is ordained by the One who 
created us as we are. We cannot overestimate the 
value of such a provision. 

But this implies that the government must be 
supported by the people. Whether it is as credit- 
able as it ought to be or not, the " power that is " 



180 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

must be sustained. It is always better than no 
" power." It is a principle of law that a right to 
be implies a right to defend being. A government 
that has a right to be has the right to support and 
defend itself. There must be taxes to pay the men 
who do the special work the government needs to 
have done. There must be the recognition of the 
authority of the officials in the realm of their duties. 
There must be places of business where people can 
find the men they seek to speak the governmental 
word of counsel. 

Thus far men will not differ. But the inference 
must go further. The right to be implies the right 
to defend itself against enemies within or without. 
However much we may shrink from it, no nation 
that has a right to be can be denied the right to 
defend itself with force of arms if need be. No one 
who lives in the protection of the police can dispute 
the right of the police to use force in protecting 
citizens from abuse or robbery. It needs but an in- 
crease of danger to justify the increase in the 
police force. 

If the danger comes from outside — that is, if 
another nation seeks to damage or destroy or sub- 
jugate it — then the police force becomes an army, 
and war ensues. There seems to be no doubt that 
the inference is necessary from the admitted divine 
ordination of government. In that sense God or- 
dains war. In that sense it is not against Christian 
principles to engage in war for self-defense. 



The Christian and the State 181 

" Wherefore we must needs be in subjection " to 
government, not only for fear of its punishments, 
but " for conscience sake." 

Another inference is necessary : 

"For this cause pay tribute also!' That is, the 
Christian should assume the share of the cost of 
the government that is assessed upon him by the 
" powers that be " — that is, by the official persons 
who have charge of such matters. 

It is not his privilege to refuse because he does 
not like the tax, nor because he thinks it unneces- 
sary. It is levied by the appointed officers and 
their demand is the demand of the whole govern- 
ment. Probably few will seriously question the 
duty to pay that kind of tribute. 

There is another tribute as justly due as taxes, 
that is, obedience to such regulations of life and 
food as the governing authorities require. Con- 
servation in certain foods has been asked for. Re- 
strictions have been put upon the use of sugar, 
wheat, meats, and fats, in order that the armies and 
navies of the country and the Allies (and these for 
the time being are as our own armies) may be well 
supplied. Autoists are required to save gasoline 
because it is needed at the front. Railroad travel 
has been limited in several ways because the mili- 
tary necessities have been so great. Coal, which is 
diverted in greatly increased quantities to manufac- 
turing and to naval use, must be used in sparing 
measure. All these are parts of the tribute that 



182 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

every citizen owes to the government. The Chris- 
tian man is under obligation to be the obedient loyal 
citizen. 

But another tribute is as surely due as taxes. 
When war is declared it is the duty of the citizen 
to assume the share of danger and perhaps death 
that the government costs. One can no more deny 
the right of the government to call men to the 
army than he can deny the right to ask him for 
taxes. In America we have so long been free from 
war, and what little we had made so light a demand 
upon us, that we have not realized what our excel- 
lent government with all its privileges and safety 
costs. Of late it has all come in a bunch. Millions 
of men and billions of money are necessary. Much 
as we shrink from brutalizing ourselves to meet the 
brutality that is arrayed against us, it is a part of 
the cost of our liberties. And we can find no argu- 
ment to sustain our refusal to meet the demand 
upon us, because the " powers that be " are or- 
dained of God and because we claim to be obedient 
in special measure to the ordinance of God. 

It follows that one who begrudges these tributes, 
or who seeks to avoid his share of the burden, is not 
only piggish and disloyal, but irreligious as well. 

There are two objections to the conclusion that 
have great weight. One is that the law of God is 
superior to any obligations of the state. It is 
pointed out that the apostles in the first days of 
the Church were commanded by the State not to 



The Christian and the State 183 

preach the Christian facts — the crucifixion and res- 
urrection of Jesus. But they refused obedience, 
saying they could not but speak the things they 
had seen and heard. Martyrs in several ages have 
died rather than submit to the dictates of the state. 
And we are accustomed to laud the devotion and 
faith of the martyrs. 

That there is some force in this is true. But it 
is to be noted that these martyrs did not refuse any 
obedience to the state that was within the prov- 
ince of the state, nor did they do anything which 
lessened the welfare and authority of the state as a 
civil power. As a matter of fact, the Christian 
people have been in all ages just what Paul taught 
that they should be, " in subjection to the powers 
that be " in all civil matters. 

And the reply may also be made that the law of 
God on these matters is not explicit. Admitting 
that the law of God is above the state, how are we 
to know what the law of God in this matter is ex- 
cept by legitimate inferences from the fact that 
governments are ordained by him? Legitimate in- 
ference from a principle becomes an explicit law. 

The other objection is made by those who say that 
the law " Thou shalt not kill " supersedes all other 
laws both by its wording and by the dignity with 
which it is accompanied. If people do in their 
hearts believe this and are not using it as a cover 
for their hesitancy to go into the army, we say the 
burden of showing that the law against killing does 



184 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

supersede the one that says " render to the gov- 
ernment its dues " is on them. " To God the things 
that are God's and to the government the things 
that belong to government " remains in force. 

If such people would be consistent, they should 
refuse to accept any of the protections that organ- 
ized government gives in which force is used and 
behind which the sword of punishment is found to 
be in operation. 

So, unpleasant as the task is, loyal service in the 
armies and navies of the nation in defense of them- 
selves or others is not against the Christian teach- 
ing but rather by the strongest inference is required. 
For the existence and authority of such are divinely 
ordained. 



CHAPTER XVI 

THE REQUIREMENTS OF CHRISTIAN FELLOWSHIP 

This section of the letter deals with a very long- 
lived tendency, and a perpetual duty. It discusses 
the " terms of membership " in the Christian 
churches. It seeks to instruct concerning who should 
come in to them and what is due to them after they 
do come in. It was suited to certain conditions in 
Rome; but it states the principles regulating the 
matter in so broad a way that we find them suited 
or suitable to our day and circumstances. 

The church at Rome as we have seen was com- 
posed of those who had come from the Jewish 
church, and those who had come from the idola- 
trous part of the community. That is, some of the 
people had been brought up in the strongest Jewish 
faith. All their lives they had been accustomed to 
observe special days of religious observance, and 
to abstain from certain foods that others used freely. 
We recall how fault was found with Jesus because 
he healed on the Sabbath day. To the Jewish lead- 
ers that was an open insult to Jehovah, for around 
that day most of the ceremonies of religion clus- 
tered. To ignore that was to strike at the whole 
system. We recall also how Peter is represented 
as sayfng to the Lord, when on the housetop at 

185 



1 86 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

Joppa he was bidden to eat from the conglomerate 
collection of animals in the sheet let down from 
heaven, " Lord, I have never eaten anything com- 
mon or unclean." 

On the other hand, there were people who never 
had known anything about these days or these re- 
strictions in food. They had been accustomed to 
days, but they were feasts, not fasts. They ate all 
the more liberally on those days. 

These two so very diverse classes were to live 
together in the church. It would be impossible for 
them to do it and not find many occasions for mu- 
tual faultfinding. The Jewish portion would think 
that the Christian faith was only the finished house 
built on the Jewish foundation. They would insist 
that the foundation should not be disturbed. The 
others would insist that, as they had received all 
the spiritual blessings without ever having gone to 
Jerusalem, or having paid any attention to the cere- 
monies their brethren thought so much of, such 
ceremonies could not be of much importance. They 
would refuse to take on any such burden for them- 
selves. 

At the center it was a conflict between the ten- 
dency to lean upon ceremonies, and the opposite 
tendency to do without any. And along with these 
there was the disposition of some to think the others 
were not as good as themselves, and an insistence 
that all should think as they did about these matters. 

There is plenty of similar conditions now. For 



The Requirements of Christian Fellowship 187 

example, in the matter of admission into the church 
of Christ, some insist that one must assent to certain 
theological statements; others, that all must have 
a certain ceremony called baptism ; others, that they 
must " tell an experience " ; and if these require- 
ments are not met to the satisfaction of the minister 
and two or three older members they are not to be 
received. 

So about the Lord's Supper. Some admit only 
those who have been to confession and received ab- 
solution from the priest; others admit only those 
who have been confirmed by the bishop. In some 
churches members must go to the minister the day 
before and get a " token " from him which admits 
them to the Supper. Some give the invitation, " All 
ye who do truly and earnestly repent of your sins 
and are in love and charity with your neighbors . . . 
draw near in faith and take this holy sacrament 
with comfort." And still others say, " All who are 
members in good standing in sister churches of 
like faith and order are invited to remain to the 
Lord's Supper." In all these various forms and 
regulations there is the same spirit that troubled 
the Roman church : namely, the tendency to refuse 
full fellowship to those who are not in agreement 
on minor points of doctrine or practice although 
they are sincere believers in Christ Jesus as Lord 
and Saviour. 

A similar difference exists in the ideas of con- 
duct. In India for example, where the converts 



i88 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

have come from great degradation of religious 
teaching, it is impossible for them to have a high 
standard of ethics. The missionaries are obliged 
to admit on a level much lower than we in this 
country think is admissible. One missionary told 
me that he insisted on two things, namely, they 
must observe the Sabbath and attend the services, 
and the other, they must not attend feasts to idols. 
This accomplishes an open separation from heathen- 
ism and secures the continuous instruction in Chris- 
tian truth. With these secured, the higher grade 
of living is attainable. In this country we have 
those who come from circles where the use of wine 
is common; others with whom the use of beer is 
as common and as innocently indulged in as are 
tea and coffee with us. This latter is especially true 
among the German people. It raises a question 
with many whether these with a much lower stand- 
ard of life should be admitted to the church. 

It seems to me that Paul's words exactly fit the 
case : " Him that is weak in faith receive ye." 

This becomes possible and practicable when it is 
remembered that the great objective of the gospel 
is to have men accept Christ. Once they put them- 
selves into submission to him, he will work in them 
the changes needed to lift their lives to the Chris- 
tian level. Men are transformed by the renewing 
of their minds. They grow in grace from children 
unto maturity. Until men have faith in Christ they 
cannot receive the help needed ; but when they ac- 



The Requirements of Christian Fellowship 189 

cept him all the forces of truth and of association 
and of hope unite to make them what they should 
be. If they have faith, all the rest is in process of 
attainment. If a man's God is Christ, then " to his 
own Lord he standeth or falleth." " And he shall 
be made to stand, for his Lord hath power to make 
him stand." " So then each one of us shall give 
account of himself to God." So we say, " Credible 
evidence of faith in Christ is the only, but vital 
prerequisite for membership in the church." 1 

It is worthy of notice that recently there has 
emerged from the depths of the religious sentiment 
of the country a very marked sympathy with this 
teaching of Paul. Not long since a very prominent 
Baptist layman 2 sent forth an address on " The 
Future of the Christian Church." Passing by the, 
as I think, too extreme views both of the so-called 
inefficiency of the churches and the force of what he 
calls the Religion of the Inarticulate, I notice that 
he sees very clearly the truth that Paul here utters : 
that the church should welcome all who have faith. 
His words, from some of which I dissent, are : 

It should be called the Church of the living God. 

Its terms of admission would be love for God, as he is 
revealed in Christ and his living spirit, and the vital 
translation of this love into a Christlike life. . . 

It would pronounce ordinance, ritual, creed, all non- 
essential for admission into the kingdom of God or his 
Church. . . 

1 Mathews, " Social Gospel," chap. I. - John D. Rockefeller, Jr. 



190 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

Its object would be to promote applied religion, not 
theoretical religion. . . It would encourage religion seven 
days in a week rather than speculation about the hereafter. 

This note is often found in the pulpit as well as 
the pew. It comes from the unconscious logic of 
the heart in those who have found Christ a helper 
and friend. Freely they have received and freely 
they desire to give the message. 

But the apostle does not stop with this much of 
instruction. He goes on to speak of what is re- 
quired of us as well as of those asking admission. 

"Let us not therefore judge one another any 
more!' This echoes the word of Jesus himself, 
"Judge not that ye be not judged." I take it that 
he means, " Do not assume the attitude of a judge 
of the people." It is not our task to separate the 
sheep from the goats. This cannot mean that we 
are not to pass judgment on conduct. We could 
not call one thing any better than another without 
passing judgment on the poorer kind. To say that 
such and such actions are unchristian is very differ- 
ent from saying that such a man is not a Christian. 
All Christians in the state of their earthly imper- 
fection do things that are unchristian. It is not 
uncommon to hear ministers say from the pulpit 
that the man that does so and so is not a Christian. 
Such statements violate the apostolic word and the 
Saviour's own command. 

One may point out the error in the conduct, and 
seek by various ways to make it appear, as it is, out 



The Requirements of Christian Fellowship 191 

of harmony with the Christian ideal; but to pass 
judgment on the person neither does him good nor 
fulfils the instruction given us. 

But the apostle goes further still. Not only are 
we to teach the brother the right way and to re- 
frain from judging him, but we are to refrain our- 
selves from doing things that are right for us if they 
do harm to him. 

Destroy not him with thy meat for whom Christ 
died, I may have such a faith, and so intelligent a 
judgment about things material and ceremonial that 
were I alone in the world, or even among those who 
were like myself free from ceremonialism, I could 
do them without sin; but if I by my conduct en- 
courage another to do what he thinks is wrong I 
become a wrong-doer, because I do damage to my 
brother. For example, one might think it entirely 
without harm for him to drive his auto for a rest 
and recreation on the Sabbath. But others have 
such an idea of the Sabbath that it appears to them 
wrong to have any sort of pleasure-rides. While 
they have that idea, it is sin for them to go on 
pleasure-rides. It is evil for that man who does it 
with a sense of doing wrong. Sin really consists 
in having a disobedient attitude toward God. Even 
when the judgment is in error so that things right 
appear to be wrong, they become sin to him, for he 
goes against his idea of right. If therefore our do- 
ings break down his spirit of obedience to what he 
thinks is right, or if our act makes it easier for him 



192 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

to disobey, then we are doing him an almost irrep- 
arable injury; for the safety of any man lies in his 
loyalty to his own best convictions of duty. The 
man who is easy to persuade against his sense of 
right is always in mortal danger of becoming a dupe 
and then a slave to sin. (James 1 : 15.) 

This has especial application in the matter of 
"temperance." It is perfectly certain that many 
people use wine at meals without the least discern- 
ible damage to themselves. It is certain that Jesus 
was not a teetotaler. At that time the issue was 
not raised. It is equally certain that if Jesus were 
here now he would be among the teetotalers. He 
would see that the influence of rum is so almost 
universally evil that he would, because of his inter- 
est in mankind, take his place among those who 
would not " for meat's " sake destroy one of those 
for whom he would give his life. This is only the 
same spirit that Paul speaks of when he says Christ 
made himself of no reputation and suffered death on 
the cross for mankind. (Phil. 2.) 

There is, however, a subtle question in this con- 
nection. Suppose, for example, that a man uses 
wine, and never has any approach to intemperance. 
He has no scruples about it in his conscience, and 
thinks it is a weakness in others that they take such 
strict views of it as to think it sinful. He thinks 
they have a sort of holy superstition. He sin- 
cerely desires to have them rid of it. If he yields 
to their weakness, does he really help to disabuse 



The Requirements of Christian Fellowship 193 

them of the error as much as he would to openly 
oppose it and show by his own case its error? In 
other words, is the best way to make men strong 
against an error to join them in it or to oppose it 
firmly ? That was the argument put to me once by 
a wealthy woman at her own dinner-table because 
I declined to take the wine that was served. I 
found the effective reply was to ask her what she 
would think of me if her son was weak in that line 
and she was fearful about him, were I to come there 
and drink wine with him. " Oh/' she replied, " that 
would be different." Yes, different; but in what 
way different? In this — she loved her son, she did 
not love the men on the street. To deny herself 
for her son's sake would be easy because she loved 
him, to do it for others' sake was not easy because 
she did not love them. After all, it is the love we 
have for our fellow men that decides these cases of 
casuistry for us. "Let us follow after things 
whereby we may edify one another." " It is good 
not to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor to do any- 
thing whereby thy brother stumbleth!' 

Then Paul goes on to another truth full of serious 
implications. " The faith which thou hast have to 
thyself before God." 

But, he adds, " Happy is the man that does not 
condemn himself in what he approves" That is, 
while a man may do things with a clear conscience, 
it may be that his judgment is in error and that he 
ought to have a conscience against them. Happy 



194 Transplanted Truths from Romans 

is the man whose decisions show that he has an 
enlightened judgment as well as a clear conscience. 
Here the apostle shows how clear his ethical ideas 
were. Conscience is not with him a " discerning 
faculty " ; it is steam in the boiler, not wisdom in the 
pilot ; it pushes, but it does not steer ; it says u Do 
right/' but it waits on judgment to know what 
right is. 

So then, we are to admit all who have faith in 
Christ, and then with mutual forbearance and un- 
failing love seek to edify one another. 

In this way we shall have real fellowship — that 
is, real partnership in this Christian business of 
making Christ's kingdom come among men. 



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